On the one hand, God doesn’t let anyone get away with anything (Romans 2:5-6). But there’s also Psalm 145:9, that “God is good to one and all; everything he does is suffused with grace” (The Message).

But horrible things happen to people in natural disasters and wars, and the animal world isn’t exactly nice either, with predatory animals knocking off other animals in gruesome ways, and viruses, flies, maggots and other nasties doing things you don’t dare watch on TV while eating. 

Such is the world God created. He intentionally “subjected it to frustration,” stuck it “in bondage to decay,” to the point that “the whole creation has been groaning in pain” all through the ages (Romans 8:20-22). So how can Psalm 145:13 say that God “is gracious in everything he does”? It was written by king David too, who had all sorts of horrible things happen to him, and yet he could write in verse 17, “the Lord is righteous in all his ways and loving toward all he has made.” 

David could say that, though, because in his own experience, “The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth (who really mean it),” verse 18. 

David had learnt that by throwing himself on God to meet his needs, God “fulfills the desires of those who fear him,” and “he hears their cry and saves them,” verses 18-19. David learnt through good old practical everyday living that God really “is near” and he does listen. 

But what happens to people who don’t take advantage of that, and don’t turn to God in their lifetimes? Is that it for them – opportunity missed, too bad? Not so, David says, because God will “satisfy the desires of every living thing,” verse 16. No one misses out on what God has in mind for us, nor does the whole creation. That’s because God is creating an “everlasting kingdom” in verse 13, with all the time in the world to fulfill that promise. This life is just the beginning, so if people don’t turn to him now, there’s lots more life to come for discovering God later. 

Which is why ”your saints tell of the glory of your kingdom and speak of your might,” verses 10-11, because the saints know firsthand, like David, that “The Lord is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and rich in love,” verse 8. The saints know that God is “faithful to his promises and loving toward ALL he has made,” verse 13. They know, therefore, that God is – and will be – good to one and all.  

I must have used Matthew 18:20 dozens of times to keep our spirits up if our church attendance has dwindled down to a faithful few. “No problem,” I could say, because Jesus said: “For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.”

Being a “small group,” therefore, was no different to being in a large church or cathedral, with its huge pipe organ making your tonsils rattle, and the choir belting out an emotional favourite, and all sorts of familiar rituals being acted out. A pity for some, perhaps, to miss all that, because that to them was “church.” But nice to know that Jesus would be just as much in attendance if we’re meeting in a home instead.   

Which I’m sure he is, but Matthew 18:20 wasn’t about that. In context, verse 15, it’s what to do when two believers have had a falling out over an offence caused by one of them. There was a process to follow. First of all, have them get together to sort it out, and hopefully the one who caused the offence listens and accepts he was at fault. 

And “If he listens, you’ve made a friend,” verse 15 (the Message). Good. But “If he won’t listen,” verse 16, “take one or two others along so that the presence of witnesses will keep things honest, and try again.” 

And if the offender still doesn’t care, or gets all defensive and chucks in a few ridiculous accusations of his own, then “If he still won’t listen,” verse 17, “tell the church.” Announce it to one and all. And if that doesn’t wake the offender up to the seriousness of his actions, then “treat him as you would a pagan or tax collector,” verse 17. Have nothing to do with him, in other words.

Refusing to admit to an offence is that serious. So serious, in fact, that when the church decides to have nothing to do with an uncaring offender, their decision is “bound in heaven,” verse 18. It has the backing, Jesus said, of “my Father in heaven,” verse 19, as does anything in church where “two of you agree about anything you ask him for.” Agreement among us is that important.  

And that’s the context of verse 20, that Jesus is certainly in attendance with two or three of his followers when they want to sort out a problem and come to an agreement together.    

Part 10, Ahaz conclusion (Part 9, March 3)

When Jesus cried out in John 7:38-39, “Whoever believes in me, streams of living water will flow from within him. By this he meant the Spirit,” it harks back to the “stream of water” flowing down from the Upper Pool to the Fuller’s Field in Isaiah 7:3. 

Because what that stream of water pictured was “the blessing of the most High” (the meaning of ‘Upper Pool’) flowing down to the fullers who used the water to clean their woollen cloth and turn it into something strong and long lasting. And here’s Jesus in John 7 – who really is “the blessing of the most High” – talking of “streams of living water” flowing out from within people because of the work of the Holy Spirit in them. 

And for the same purpose too. The blessing of the most High flowing into Ahaz would have transformed him from being a scared child into a strong, confident leader, so he could stand before his people and cry out, “I know God will strengthen and help us, because he did it for me.” This was the opportunity God offered Ahaz, including whatever sign Ahaz wanted that would prove what God was promising both him and his people was true. 

If only Ahaz had trusted God, then, because what a different story it would have been. And how frustrating it is for us too, that Ahaz didn’t grab what God was freely offering, because now we’re left hanging not knowing what might have happened instead if he had. 

So, what was the purpose of that story if we’re left with no idea of what sign Ahaz would have asked for, and no amazing story of God responding? But what if it was written in preparation for God offering the same opportunity again, so that those it was being offered to wouldn’t make the same mistake? 

Because through Jesus that’s exactly what he’s done. He’s re-created the scene all over again. We’ve got a stream of water too, also picturing the blessing of the most High flowing into us, and for the same reason, to transform us from being frightened and frail human beings in scary times into a force of strength, confidence and courage for those we care for. 

And with an amazing sign to prove it, the Holy Spirit “within” us doing in us what God would have done in Ahaz, so that we too can say to those we know are having trouble coping in these scary times in 2023, “I know God is real, because he’s proved it again and again to me.” 

Because what have we got to offer people if we haven’t got that? If I have no story to tell that God is real, I’m just another typical human being who gets all stressed out and looks to worldly methods for coping, just like Ahaz, none of which will give me, or the people I care for, the peace that only God can give. 

Which makes the story of Ahaz highly relevant for us today, because it shows us that God is more than willing to make himself real to us in our scary moments, so we can be a fearless strength for others.

Part 2 – Luciferian (Demonic on March 2)

The word “luciferian” describes ego and pride. Witness the ego-driven attitudes of those in government, the medical profession, mainstream media, and many others who careened through the pandemic making decisions that have since proved to be disastrous – who cannot or will not admit it. 

They’re too proud for that. So was the king of Tyre in Ezekiel 28:12, whose “heart became proud on account of your beauty, and you corrupted your wisdom because of your splendour,” verse 17, “by using it to get worldly fame” (The Message). 

So here was a man who ended up with a gigantic ego because of his impressive looks and brilliant mind. He stood out as someone people naturally looked up to, and he used it to get a name for himself. We had people like that during the pandemic too, who were looked upon as saviours and saints. 

But as new facts now emerge that hint at some ghastly mistakes made in policies quickly implemented without proper evidence, resulting in considerable damage to physical and mental health, and to the economy, and to trust in hallowed institutions, no one who was instrumental in causing these problems has apologized or admitted fault. Rather than say, “We blew it and we’re deeply sorry, and we’ll do anything we can to heal and help,” they call the people who are criticizing them nasty names.

But that’s the luciferian attitude in Isaiah 14:12. It’s where the word “Lucifer” came from, translated in Latin from the Hebrew for “the morning star.” It describes the attitude of the king of Babylon (verse 4), who believed he was a god, expressed in statements like: “I will raise my throne above the stars of God,” and “I will make myself the Most High” (verses 13 and 14). It highlights how pride and ego can consume those in leadership positions, including, as we’ve seen, Christian leaders too.  

To such people God says, “Because you think you are wise, as wise as a god,” Ezekiel 28:6, be warned because “You will be but a man, not a god, in the hands of those who slay you,” verse 9. So a luciferian attitude is not a good place to be, because “pride ends in humiliation,” Proverbs 29:23 (NLT).    

God’s mandate for all governments is Romans 13:4. They are all “God’s servants to do you good.” So the focus of anyone in a government position, or any position of authority, like a policeman or teacher, is the good of the people they are serving. And the “common good” too, meaning what is best for everyone, not just the most vocal few. 

So the goal of anyone in a position of authority or responsibility is to find out what is best for everyone in their care. Unfortunately, many governments of late have been enacting legislation without the consent of their citizens, but claiming “We’re doing it for the common good.” But how do they decide what the common good is? 

If it’s “common” then it must be what most citizens agree to, right? So what mechanism have those in government positions put in place to find out what the common good is from the people’s perspective? Government can’t just decide what the common good is if it has no idea what the people are thinking. But nowadays we’ve even got non-elected officials with no government authority deciding in their globalist huddles what is best for us. 

But how do they know what’s best for us? Or have they simply taken it upon themselves to decide by their own definition what’s best, because, they claim, “The people don’t know what’s best for them, so they need us to decide for them.” I actually heard a Prime Minister say that back in 2008 during the last mess we were in. 

I’ve come to realize that both elected and non-elected individuals in our present system of influence and authority don’t know what’s best for us, because they’re not living in the real world we’re in. I’ve only had one politician visit my home for a chat before an election, and it was just an infomercial for their party platform, and not one question about what I thought. So much for searching out “the common good,” or knowing what it was from me.  

I’m so glad I found out the meaning of ekklesia as the word used for “church” in Scripture. Because it meant a town coming together to debate and discuss what was the right course to take in the best interests of all. And the people together did that, not some official deciding for them. Hopefully, then, it’s in God’s church that we see how good government works. 

Thousands and thousands of people around the world are waking up to the dreadful and disheartening realization that the institutions we trust in to serve us and keep us safe and healthy are heavily administered by people who’ve been corrupted and made stupid by their myopic obsession with power and money, and their own pious, moralizing public image. 

It’s been quite a shock comparing the world today to what it was three years ago. One has to wonder, then, that if it’s this bad already, how bad is it yet to become, thanks to those in the medical profession, the media, the government, the schools and universities, and of course the profiteering drug companies, who have all ignored facts, hidden facts, resisted facts, and refused to admit they’re wrong when obvious facts are revealed.  

It may be a shock, then, that the entire world seems to have gone crazy, but it’s nothing new. Paul wrote a shocking description of his world in Romans 1:29-32, as “filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity.” So he too had to witness people in positions of power and influence who were “full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice.” And all over his world too, people were “gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful.” And he too had to put up with people who seemed to take pleasure in “inventing ways of doing evil” because they were “senseless, faithless, heartless, and ruthless.” They simply didn’t care what damage they did to other people. Psychopaths without conscience.      

So what we’re going through isn’t some new phenomenon that’s never been experienced before. It’s jolly helpful of Paul, then, to explain why it happens, and why it keeps on happening. 

It happens, he writes, when people “do not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God.” And God does not take that lightly, because “he gives such people over to a depraved mind,” verse 28. They cannot think straight, like those piously demanding net zero carbon emissions in just seven years time, who haven’t even considered the vast changes necessary to make that happen, or the damage it would do to poor people. 

But what about those who DO “think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God”? What’s in store for them? Paul goes on to say in Romans 2:7, that “To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honour and immortality, he will give eternal life.” One day, waking up to a wonderful world.  

We’re in a world that hides information if it doesn’t fit the prevailing government narrative, or if it proves what government did was wrong and damaging, or it exposes the real motives of corporations that continue to sell us a bill of goods as “safe and effective,” while understating and even ignoring the multiple millions of people known to be suffering from adverse effects. 

The creativity and ingenuity these “hiders” give to excuses, cover-ups, and lies is formidable. So for someone seeking accurate, up-to-date research and data to enable INFORMED consent, he or she soon discovers it’s a minefield of censorship, accusations of spreading misinformation and hate, being publicly branded as a racist, extremist, terrorist, anti-science activist and conspiracy theorist, or of being a white supremacist Nazi, a threat to the economy, and amazingly even a misogynist.      

You can’t help but be suspicious, therefore, that with all this aggressive vitriol the powers-that-be are trying to hide something. 

But let’s give governments and corporations the benefit of the doubt and assume they have our best interests in mind. They have a problem, however, because what they believe to be in our best interests may not be what we believe or agree to. And that risks protest, panic and even revolution. So I can see why they feel justified in not making their plans too public. 

But they can’t hide what they’re doing forever, because their dream of some sort of global, planet-saving utopia will involve massive change and a lot of people will suffer, as many already are. And that means the hiders have to get even more creative in their cover-ups. 

But give them credit, they are very good at it. History also shows, however, that we’re not that difficult to deceive: I mean, we think celebrities and politicians – and even the media (gasp) – are telling the truth. 

So I accept I can be deceived too – and Jesus did warn us that we could be (Matthew 24:24). But there’s a warning for the hiders too, in Hebrew 4:13, that “there is no creature hidden from God’s sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of him to whom we must give account.”      

I wonder how long it will be until God calls the justice systems in our western nations to account. And just so they know what to expect when he does, there’s a Psalm explaining exactly what God is ticked off at – in all judges, including those God assigned as judges in the spirit realm (the meaning of “gods” in Psalm 82:1?) 

Human or spirit, verse 1, “God calls the judges into his courtroom” (The Message). So the first point all judges need to note is: they are not the ultimate authority. They can be called to account by a court far superior to theirs, that “puts all the judges in the dock” (verse 1).

So please picture yourselves, dear judges, in the dock with God presiding as your judge. And he’s not a happy judge either. He yells at you, “Enough,” or perhaps to get the point across more personally: I, God, have had enough of you miserable specimens, because, verse 2, “You’ve corrupted justice long enough.” And fittingly, a revealing book just came out with the title, “Justice corrupted,” describing our present day arrogant judges and lawless prosecutors intimidating and silencing anyone standing in the way of their agenda, including distraught parents speaking up for their children. 

To which God says, “You’re here (all those of you involved in the justice system) to defend the defenceless, to make sure that underdogs get a fair break, to stand up for the powerless, and prosecute all those who exploit them,” verses 3-4.    

“That’s what I commissioned you judges for, each one of you, to be my personal deputies,” verse 6. “But you’ve betrayed your commission,” so – and here comes God’s indictment of these “Ignorant judges,” as he calls them in verse 5 – “you’re now stripped of your rank, busted.” 

To which Asaph, the author of Psalm 82, writes: “O God, give them their just desserts.” Give them what they deserve. Or as another translation phrases verse 8: “Rise up, O God, judge the earth, for all the nations are your inheritance.” In other words, we’re trusting you, God, to be the judge of those responsible for taking care of us, since all nations are under your jurisdiction.

So thanks for the reminder, Asaph, that God sees all, and there is a point in time when he calls corrupt judges to account. And if not now, then for certain on the day God has set aside in Acts 17:31, “when he will judge the world with justice by the man he has appointed,” the risen Son of God. 

Jesus made some extraordinary claims about himself that, if true, would be good reason for taking him seriously. Like the claim he made in John 11:25-26, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” 

Well, if we don’t believe it, do we have good reason not to? Yes, if Jesus was a fictional character from a fake book supposedly written by people who really lived, but didn’t. Because no human being has the power to give people life after they die; or that by simply believing in him means death has no hold over us. Only a delusional, rather sick person would make promises like that.

But there is this person in history who did make promises like that, that if true are well worth taking seriously, because they answer two bothersome questions: “What’s the point of life if it only ends in death?” And “If there is life after death, how do we know there is?” And maybe a third question, “What kind of life is it if, by chance, we do come back to life again?” 

Well, Jesus answered all three: first of all, that life doesn’t end in death. Secondly, we can know there’s life after death because we can experience it in our lives now; and, thirdly, we can know what kind of life we’ll come back to because of the life he came back to after he, as a human just like us, died.

It’s the second of those three points I would challenge first, because how on earth can we experience our life after death now? 

The simple answer given in 1 John 3:14 is that “we know we’ve passed from death to life because we love others as our brothers and sisters.” And added to that in verse 15: “Anyone who doesn’t love is as good as dead.” In other words, “life” in our experience as humans, now and forever, temporary or eternal, comes down to the same thing: where love is, life is. And where love isn’t, life isn’t.  

Experiencing love, then, is experiencing eternal life. So there are probably tons of our fellow humans who, with no knowledge or interest in the Bible or God, are experiencing a taste of eternal life. And if they only knew the kind of love Jesus has, and is quite willing to share with us too, their experience of eternal life would become greater still. Good enough reason, I would think, for taking Jesus seriously.     

Part 9, King Ahaz (Part 8, Feb 24)

Imagine being king Ahaz, terrified at the prospect of powers beyond his control about to destroy his nation – much like some of us may feel today faced with powers beyond our control threatening to wreck our world as well. So is there something in this story of Ahaz that has meaning for us too? 

God, for instance, gave Ahaz clues in children’s names and locations that spelled out clearly what he would do for Ahaz and his nation. One clue being the sign God gave to Ahaz to prove that he, God, could be trusted to deal with Ahaz’s dread and remove what was causing it (Isaiah 7:16), the sign being a child born whose name would be Immanuel (verse 14). 

Well, it didn’t mean much to Ahaz, but another child called Immanuel would be born 700 years later, who would take people’s minds back to this child in Isaiah, because Matthew quotes this verse from Isaiah when applying it to the birth of Jesus (Matthew 1:23). So, what might seem like a rather obscure sign in Isaiah for Ahaz, suddenly jumps out of its context as a sign of another Immanuel sent by God – and for the same reason, to rescue and save God’s people.    

And this is where the location – that God had Ahaz meet with Isaiah at – also jumps out of its context for us today. 

The meeting spot was “at the end of the aqueduct of the Upper Pool, on the road to the Fuller’s Field,” Isaiah 7:3. So a stream of water flowing down from a Pool meaning ‘the blessing of the most High’ was made use of by ‘fullers’ to wash their woollen cloth clean of all dirt and other debris, and along with some serious pounding turn their cloth into something long lasting, protective against the elements, and a pleasure to wear. 

The message for Ahaz clearly being that God would do all these things for Ahaz to turn him from being a scaredy-cat and a weakling into a strong, confident, and inspiring leader for his people – if, that is, Ahaz believed him. 

Ahaz didn’t, but God didn’t end the story of Ahaz there, because the Immanuel pictured by Isaiah appeared again, yelling out to the crowd at the temple in John 7:38-39, “Whoever believes in me, streams of living water will flow from within him. By this he meant the Spirit.” 

A flowing stream of water, eh? Just like the stream of water flowing down from the Upper Pool as a blessing from the Most High for Ahaz. And here it was again. But would we catch the meaning of it?….(part 10, March 10)