Month: April 2020

The Storm, the Shipwreck and the Shore.

Then Paul said to the centurion and the soldiers, “Unless these men STAY WITH THE SHIP, you cannot be saved”. Acts 27:31

God was with the ship’s company throughout all these desperate events. He’d spoken through Paul and given an assurance that all on board the ship would be saved. ‘Nevertheless we must run aground on some island’. V26 Paul had accurately told the company that they needed to run aground, beach the ship on an island(Malta). They dropped anchors to stop or slow the ship and WAITED UNTIL DAYLIGHT, waited until they could see their situation clearly.

“In an attempt to escape from the ship, the sailors let the lifeboat down into the sea, pretending they were going to lower some anchors from the bow”. Paul then gave the centurion the order, ‘unless they stay, YOU cannot be saved’. So the soldiers cut the ropes and the lifeboat fell away.

Sometimes, like it or not, we are in things together. A ship could represent a ministry, or some other group of people, large or small. The enemy loves to isolate us, cut us off all alone. God told Paul that they all had to stay together if they were going to be saved. I feel for some today that we need to stay with the others around us, NOT go it alone! There are storms today, but there can be safety in numbers.

Paul told the people ‘to eat’, get some strength after fasting fourteen days. We may need to break the worry cycle and help our bodies to cope in the midst of the suspense. Practical steps can be helpful in times of anxiety. All 276 people, weak and strong were saved. God fulfilled His word to Paul. Whatever our situation God is able, He brought these people through, from the Storm, the Shipwreck to the Shore and Safety.

May God bless and keep you today and bring you safely ashore from the storm you’re  in right now.

 

 

“For I have faith in God that it will happen just as he told me”. Acts 27:25

So the winds had been against the ship Paul was sailing on, but they ignored his advice and ‘when a gentle south wind began to blow they left and sailed along the shore of Crete’.  The gentle south wind was a deception(it’s so easy for us to read into our situations what we want). ‘Before very long a wind of hurricane force, the north-easter swept down from Crete’. Things began to get really bad, they could hardly secure the life boat. Then they threw the cargo overboard and next day the ships tackle, desperate situation. ‘When neither sun nor stars appeared for many days(dark situation), we finally gave up all hope of being saved’. (Acts was written by doctor Luke, seems like he was on the ship).

‘After the men had gone a long time without food, Paul stood up and said, you should have listened to me, but an angel of God appeared last night and stood beside me and said, “Don’t be afraid Paul, you must stand before Caesar and God has graciously given YOU the lives of all who sail with you”’. “So keep up your courage men, for I have faith it will happen just as he told me”! Paul declared God’s Word into their desperate situation to give them hope.

Sometimes storms seem like they’re never going to end, but eventually they always do! I have visited the Faroe Islands, far out in the Atlantic Ocean, south of Iceland and north of Scotland, linked to Denmark. I met a retired ship’s captain called Elmar, who had gone on a fishing boat at age 15 to Greenland. There was a bad storm, no one could eat or have a warm drink for three days(couldn’t heat food or drink). He spent his whole life fishing in those northern seas, but he never forgot that storm(he was very young). Storms teach us things that we would never learn in the easy going routine of everyday life and we all have our own life’s storms.

Paul’s ship eventually ran aground a sand bar near Malta and Paul had to tell the centurion not to allow the sailors to leave or they couldn’t be saved. This time they listened to him and after eating some food the entire ship’s company of 276 were saved. God had not abandoned them, the ship was destroyed but the people lived.

We may find ourselves in storms for different reasons, like the story of Job, but God is with us in the storm. Don’t lose hope, He cares for us and will help us in the buffeting.

God bless and keep you in the storms of life.

Pay attention to your circumstances AND continue to seek God for revelation. Acts 27

Paul was on his last major journey to Rome to witness for the Lord in the heart of the empire. His journey started well enough, as the centurion showed him kindness and allowed his friends to take care of his needs. Paul was a prisoner and therefore of little importance in men’s eyes, yet if it hadn’t been for Paul’s presence many people might have perished! The presence of God’s man made the difference between disaster and death.

Even on the first leg of the voyage the winds were unfavourable. “From there we put out to sea again and passed to the lee of Cyprus because the winds were against us.  We made slow headway for many days and had difficulty arriving of Cnidus.  When the wind did not allow us to hold to our course, we sailed to the lee of Crete, opposite Salmone. We moved along the coast with difficulty and came to a place called Fair Havens, near the town of Lasea”.

God can guide us in many ways, but He does speak to us through our circumstances and if things are not lining up for us then we need to pause and ask why?

The sailings were dogged by difficulties and progress was slow. But even more importantly time was passing and ‘it had already become dangerous because by now it was after the Fast(Day of Atonement, it was autumn and storms  had begun in the Mediterranean Sea)’.

Ecclesiastes 3 & 8 speak about timing;

“Whoever obeys His command will come to no harm and the wise heart will know the proper time and procedure. For there is a proper time and procedure for every matter”.

It is good to know the will of God for something in our lives but we need to know the timing as well. Rarely does everything unfold at once, more often we have to walk things out until the ‘proper time and procedure’ unfolds.

In Acts 27:10 Paul the prisoner warned the centurion and the sailors that this voyage would be a disaster for ship and cargo and their own lives(God later spared their lives). Sometimes the cost of pressing on with something is just too high and the outcome can be great loss. These men wouldn’t listen and paid the price.

God always wants the best for us, but we need to be aware of our circumstances and if God speaks to us through outside sources then we need to pay attention. Seek His will and His timing to avoid disastrous situations.

God bless and keep us this day.

 

 

 

Do not work for bread that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. John 6:27

Jesus had recently fed the five thousand people with the loaves and fish. Here He told them that ‘they were following Him, not because they saw miraculous signs but because they ate the loaves and had their fill’. People were following the Lord Himself to have their own personal needs met and He told them to work for bread that endures to eternal life.

Next the people told Him, ‘our forefathers ate manna in the desert’. Manna sustained Israel in the desert but had a limited life span. Jesus told them it is my Father who gives the true bread from heaven. He declared the first of the seven ‘I am’ statements in John’s Gospel, “I am the bread of life”. Jesus was ever trying to lift peoples’ eyes from the physical realm to the eternal.

Jesus then began a controversial line of speaking which offended some of the Jews. “I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live for ever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.  I tell you the truth, unless you can eat the flesh of the son of man and drink his blood you have no life in you”. John 6:51,53. Today it’s easier for us to understand that this is fulfilled in our sharing the Lord’s Supper or Holy Communion. I’ve heard several speakers saying that in these days we will need to be partaking of the emblems daily, to be firmly connected to the Lord.

“From this time many of His disciples ‘turned back’(when we turn away from the Lord we are going backwards) and no longer followed Him. John 6:66 The insertion of chapters and verses into the word came a long time after it was written and were not divinely inspired. Nevertheless, it is interesting that the reference to this verse where many disciples stopped following Jesus is 6:66, three sixes. Six is the number of man and 666 is the number of the beast in Revelation 13:18. I can only say that we as members of His body need to be taking these emblems;

“This cup is the new covenant in my blood. This do, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of Me”. NKJV 1 Cor 11:25

God bless and keep you this day and forevermore.

 

Shedding religion, seeking relationship.

John 4 is the story of Jesus meeting the Samaritan woman at the well. It precedes some of Paul’s conversations mentioned yesterday, Jesus talking about living water while the woman came for the natural well water. Jesus began with the natural to lift her eyes to spiritual realities.

Even the name Samaritan was a term of contempt to religious Jews, yet Jesus engaged with this woman, to her surprise. After recognising Him as a prophet, she began to discuss the place where God should be worshipped, on this mountain or in Jerusalem?

‘BELIEVE ME WOMAN, A TIME IS COMING when you will worship the Father neither… place(He was saying the Temple in Jerusalem, traditional Jewish religion, would no longer be at the heart of worshipping God). Yet A TIME IS COMING AND HAS NOW COME when true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth’. John 4:21,23 Jesus had just announced a new era, the age of the Church, to a Samaritan and a woman!

’Many of the Samaritans from that time believed in him because of the woman’s testimony. ‘He told me everything I ever did’. And because of His words many more became believers. …now we have HEARD HIM FOR OURSELVES, we know that this man is the Saviour of the world’. Jn 4:39-42

These Samaritans, in a sense had leap-frogged or jumped past the religious traditions of the Temple(from which they were excluded anyway)! They’d had personal encounter with the Lord and become believers in Him. The religious people resolutely opposed Jesus and later Paul, they fought to protect all the rituals of their traditions, but the new era had begun. Could we today be at a similar time in history(His story), are we moving from the Church age to the age of the Kingdom, coming now on the earth? If the answer is yes, then we too will have to shed much of our way of doing things. True worship for these Samaritans began with an encounter and they had grace to accept what the Lord offered them.

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God bless and keep you this day.

 

 

 

‘But I have had God’s help to this very day and so I stand here and testify to small and great alike’. Acts 26:22

Paul had shared before King Agrippa, Governor Festus and others, how Jesus had met with him on the Damascus Road and appointed him, ‘as a servant and a witness of what you have seen of Me AND what I will show you’. Paul had a miraculous encounter with the Lord, which I said yesterday changed the course of his life, but Jesus said that He still had more to show him. There is always more with the Lord, we will never come to an end of God. We should ‘never be settlers’ here on earth, God always has more for us.

I recently heard a definition of Carnality, by Derek Prince; he said it was when we began to live our lives as if everything was down here and there was no heaven, nothing eternal, only this physical realm. The Lord hates carnality.

Paul was standing in man’s court and yet he was speaking of Heavenly truths and realities. Some of these people were of high position and educated, but their own minds blocked the truth of Paul’s message.

At this point Festus interrupted Paul’s defence. “You are out of your mind, Paul”! He shouted. “Your great learning is driving you insane”. Acts 26:24

We too, like Paul, are appealing to people about another realm, another existence(we are ambassadors here for Christ). Some can grasp that truth and for others it’s hidden from them. Only the Lord can open eyes to the other existence, outside of time and the physical realm.

‘No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws them…’. John 6:44

Paul said, ‘but I have had God’s help to this very day’, he hadn’t been left alone. Jews and Gentiles alike had rejected and abused him, but he knew it was because of God’s help that he stood testifying to all the people in the court. Those of us reading this are also ‘still here today’ and God therefore still has things for us to do. He hasn’t left us alone, He’s with us and able to help and guide us. Please ask Him to show what He has for you to do today. It wasn’t over for Paul and it’s not over for you and I either.

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The Lord wants to speak to us and help us.

God bless and keep you today.

 

 

Our life’s starting point may be the direct opposite of what the Lord’s plan is for us! Change of our hearts needed.

When Paul was standing before King Agrippa he acknowledged his persecution of the early church, imprisonment and death.

“I too was convinced that I ought to do all that was possible to oppose the name of Jesus of Nazareth. And that is just what I did in Jerusalem. On the authority of the chief priests I put many of the saints in prison and when they were put to death, I cast my vote against them”. Acts 26:9,10

Paul goes on to tell of his Damascus road experience about noon(brightest time of day) and how Jesus spoke with him and called him to be His witness.

In 1748 a man called John Newton was on board a ship, the Greyhound, returning to England. The ship was caught in a terrible storm off the coast of Donegal, Ireland(Atlantic Ocean) and began to sink. He prayed for God’s mercy and the storm died down. After another four weeks the ship made it to port in Lough Swilly, Donegal. This marked the beginning of his conversion to Christianity, and he began to read the Bible and other literature. He marked the anniversary of the 10th March 1748 for the rest of his life.

John Newton had been involved in the slave trade and for a time still was, but he eventually became an evangelical minister in the Church of England, laterally in London. A young member of Parliament, William Wilberforce, who’d recently had his own conversion experience came to John Newton for advice. Should he leave Parliament? Newton told him to serve where he was(good advice, God can move us) and Wilberforce became the man who got slavery abolished in Britain(he literally gave his life to achieve this). Newton lived to see the abolition of slavery passed into law,  but died the same year, 1807.

John Newton wrote a number of hymns, including ‘Amazing Grace’.

Amazing grace! How sweet the sound that saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found; was blind but now I see.

‘Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, and grace my fears relieved; How precious did that grace appear, the hour I first believed. Etcetera

We are all born at certain times, in specific places and into communities with different cultures. The Lord seeks to meet us all in our various lives and bring His call to us. The apostle Paul and John Newton found their calling to be diametrically opposed to what they’d been doing in their lives prior to the Lord’s intervention.

It is a safe thing to trust Him to fulfill the desire that He creates. Amy Carmichael, repeated.

Will we trust Him to do it for us and in us?

God bless and keep you and make His face shine upon you today.

 

 

 

Turn, Stay, Go — Navigating the journey of life with our Lord.

Paul was famous for his missionary journeys, taking the Gospel around different cities, travelling by land and by sea. Many Bibles have maps in the back(which aren’t looked at very often), but some of these maps usually show Paul’s journeys, which formed part of his life’s journey.

Turn –  when they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, “Come over to Macedonia  and help us”. Acts 16:7,9. ( Saint Patrick had a similar vision of a man calling him to come over to Ireland ).

Stay – ‘One night the Lord spoke to Paul in a vision. Do not be afraid; keep on speaking, do not be silent. For I am with you, and no one is going to attack and harm you, because I have many people in this city. So Paul stayed there for a year and a half, teaching them the word of God’. Acts 18:9,10,11.

Go – …I saw the Lord speaking, “Quickly,  leave Jerusalem immediately, because they will not accept your testimony about me”. Acts 22:18.

The Lord gives us free will to make our choices and take our journeys, but He also speaks to us and directs us to keep us on Heaven’s path for our lives. Our daily walk is part of our life’s journey and like Paul we want to ‘finish the race and complete the task the Lord has given us’. Acts 20:24.

Amy Carmichael, whom I mentioned yesterday, started out training to go to China with Hudson Taylor, but her health wasn’t good enough. Then she went to Japan for a year and finally to Ceylon/Sri Lanka. She lastly moved to Bangalore for her health, step by step, drawing closer to her life’s calling. We may not get to the centre of God’s purpose for our lives at once, there may be twists and turns along the way, but He is faithful and will guide us. Sometimes we have to walk with Him to see what and where He’s called us to.

God bless and keep you today.

‘Missionary life is simply a chance to die’. Amy Carmichael

Sometimes our biggest hindrance can yield the choicest fruit, if we’re willing.

Paul was an apostle, but also the first missionary to the Gentiles and it’s notable how much of his time at the end of his life was spent in chains. Paul witnessed at length to some very important people while he was a prisoner and  most importantly for us he also wrote letters(epistles).

‘… pray that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the Gospel, for which I am an ambassador in chains’. Eph 6:20

‘Remember Jesus Christ, raised from the dead, descended from David(he was a Jewish Messiah). This is my Gospel, for which I am suffering, even to the point of being chained…’.   2 Tim 2:9

Amy Carmichael was born in N.Ireland on 16 December 1867 and she later founded an orphanage and a mission in southern India to rescue young girls from temple prostitution. She worked fifty five years without furlough, no jet aircraft in those days, India became her true home.

I haven’t read her story for some time but in 1931 she fell and became bedridden for much of the last two decades of her life. She wrote many books during this time and her writings reached a much wider audience than her mission work. I believe the Lord asked her if she would give Him permission to use her in those last years as He wished, before her fall. So her greatest incapacity became the most productive season of her life! (Much of her story is available online).

When she died aged eighty three, she asked that no gravestone be erected over her grave. The children put a bird bath with the single word ‘Amma’, mother, because they said she loved them.

‘It is a safe thing to trust Him to fulfill the desire that He creates’. Amy

God bless you and keep you today.

 

 

God will use this time to bring many people to Him. Isa 24

A friend recently sent me a prophecy given by the late David Wilkerson in 1986 based on Isa 24. In my Bible I have notes from a talk by my spiritual mentor, Kjell Sjoberg, in 1993 from the same chapter in Isaiah. Kjell likened the situation to a picture with a dark frame but a bright centre!

The frame/background of the picture describes the dark situation in the world;

v1 scatter its inhabitants, many refugees today.

v2 it will be the same for ‘priests as for people, master as for servant, mistress as for maid, seller as for buyer, for borrower as for lender, for debtor as for creditor’. All sectors of the economy and commerce will be touched.

v4,5 the earth dries up and withers, speaks of the environment suffering.

v7-11 entertainment will stop, the entrance to every house is barred, no one is going out or coming in(how exactly this describes today). There is more on the darkness but we need to focus on the coming light.

v14,15,16 The LIGHT at the CENTRE of the picture;

They raise their voices, they shout for joy; from the West they acclaim the Lord’s majesty.

Therefore in the East give glory to the Lord; exalt the name of the Lord, the God of Israel(Israel is the centre) in the islands of the sea(must include Ireland and Britain, I hope).

From The ends of the earth(whole world will be aware of this) we hear singing: GLORY TO THE RIGHTEOUS ONE.

God knows what’s happening and He will work out His purposes in the midst of all the disruption. As the song says, ‘ Be bold, be strong, for the Lord your God is with you X2. I am not afraid, I am not dismayed, for I’m walking in faith and victory…’

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God bless and keep you and make His face shine upon you and give you peace in these days.