Twirling in love

[whatisthis]

It is often a very lonely thing to be a human in this world. We all need Someone to love, adore--and even actually to worship. I have been thinking a lot since my Daddy faded from my earthly view, a year ago in April, I always have thought a lot but more now, and missing him has been a focus. My Daddy believed in women's ordination, strongly. I didn't. And for me, I don't think I do even now. I started out asking questions here, not having answers, but I think I do see God could ordain women for a ministry task, and I thank God for His church. But way above all that, I thank God for God!

I think the most wonderful promise ever given in the Bible is that God would go with humans, His house would be among us, and we would not be alone:

Exo 25:8 And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them.

Mat 1:23 Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, And they shall call his name Immanuel; which is, being interpreted, GOD WITH US.

Exo 29:45 And I will dwell among the children of Israel, and will be THEIR GOD.

Exo 25:22 And there I will meet with thee, and I will commune WITH THEE from above the mercy seat,

l.

God does not want to be separated from you and me, to leave us lonely. God's first response to man's sin was actually to call out to man:

Gen 3:9 And the LORD God called unto the man, and said unto him, Where art thou?

Jesus told a story about a prodigal, (who is an example of someone who feels lonely and unworthy to be loved.) A lot of people relate the prodigal to someone who runs away from religion, but I don't think that is it. The story goes like this:

Luk 15:19, 20 (he said) I am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants. And he arose, and came to his father. But while he was yet afar off, his father saw him, and was moved with compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and KISSED HIM.

That is how God feels about all humans--especially when we are loneliest, most lost in the lonely, most longing for belonging. That is why it speaks to my heart. I'm someone who wants to love and be loved. I remember the sheep story too, quite often. It went:

Mat 18:12-14 How think ye? if any man have a hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and go unto the mountains, and seek that which goeth astray? And if so be that he find it, verily I say unto you, he rejoiceth over it more than over the ninety and nine which have not gone astray. Even so it is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish.

It's true, if you're thinking about law, our God has rules, and means them:

Gen 2:16, 17 And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.

It's like this. God forewarned first man and first woman, but hey, they did not truely understand a God of love. They disobeyed because they did not truely-really know that God's rules were not evil.

Now the devil knew the height and depth of God's love when he disobeyed. God knew that if he made humans at all he'd be exposing them, but he had humans already planned and already loved them before he knew them. So even though God knew what would happen when man was exposed to that level of rebellion in our naive state, he just had to make us.

So God planned a substitute for us right from the foundation of the world!

Rev 13:8 And all that dwell on the earth shall worship him, every one whose name hath not been written in the book of life of the Lamb that hath been slain from the foundation of the world.

Jesus was promised to be the "seed of woman" to save his people from the messups that had separated them into this mess:

Mat 1:21 And she shall bring forth a son; and thou shalt call his name JESUS; for it is he that shall save his people from their sins.

The law they broke was clear, and if God had not begun to step in that day, humans would have died:

Gen 2:17 "but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die."

It was true, sin brought separation to us all. But God gently clothed man and woman before sending them outside in the wind:

Gen 3:21 And the LORD God made for Adam and for his wife coats of skins, and clothed them.

And he did sadly send them out

Gen 3:23, 24 therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.

But God didn't just sit there in the garden. His rebuke to the serpent was also the first promise to humans. The enmity to sin would come from God and the seed of woman, would be the very Creator, who would crush Satan in the end:

Gen 3:15 and I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.

God was going to crown part of Himself with mission impossible that only God could make and only the Son of man could be accepted in:

Heb 1:8-10 but of the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever; And the sceptre of uprightness is the sceptre of thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated iniquity; Therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee With the oil of gladness above thy fellows. And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth, And the heavens are the works of thy hands!

All that gladness is for us.

So I would say, may your steps go lightly today! Just feast with God, my dear one! He is for us.

Yes, sin is about. Sin is a predatory beast, like the serpent, lurking at the door, and it grabs us and claims our exile and depresses and worries us. It's terrible! God both warns us about sin, and tells us we may rule over this lurking danger:

Gen 4:6-7 And the LORD said unto Cain, Why art thou wroth? and why is thy countenance fallen? If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin coucheth at the door: and unto thee shall be his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.

God's promise provides a sanctuary from sin, and He dwells in that sanctuary, among us!

Exo 25:8 And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them.

Jesus, who created us, is the Adam, or Man who hates iniquity, he is the anointed one:

Heb 1:9-10 Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated iniquity; Therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee With the oil of gladness above thy fellows.

And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth, And the heavens are the works of thy hands:

Through Jesus God implants the spirit of loving righteousness and hating iniquity into me!

Gen 4:7 If thou doest well, shalt thou not be accepted? and if thou doest not well, sin lieth at the door. And unto thee his desire, and thou shalt rule over him.

Poor God, loving man so, God had to send man out, but he goes out with us!

His sanctuary is with us in the desert of our wandering if we choose to look:

Exo 25:8 And let them make me a sanctuary; that I may dwell among them.

It is through this promise and this gift that men have walked and talked with God:

Gen 5:24 And Enoch walked with God:

Exo 33:11 And the LORD spake unto Moses face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend.

Heb 12:14 Follow peace with all and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord:

We are not alone, and don't even need to be desperately lonely because He is our peace!

Luk_19:38 Saying, Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord: PEACE in heaven, and glory in the highest.

Jdg 6:22, 23 And when Gideon perceived that he was an angel of the LORD, Gideon said, Alas, O Lord GOD! for because I have seen an angel of the LORD face to face. And the LORD said unto him, Peace be unto thee; fear not: thou shalt not die.

And though we do have enemies, satanic opposition if you will, we have a partner to take our backs in a way no other partner could ever do!

Exo_14:14 The LORD shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace.

I find Jesus actually takes on any of my wormiest feelings:

Psa 22:5,6 They cried unto thee, and were delivered: they trusted in thee, and were not confounded.

But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men, and despised of the people.

That is Jesus cry, foretold. Morning and evening, (times that can be the loneliest times,) God symbolically foretold his lasting presence:

Exo 29:38 Now this is that which thou shalt offer upon the altar; two lambs of the first year day by day continually.

Exo 29:39 The one lamb thou shalt offer in the morning; and the other lamb thou shalt offer at even:

The songs of David tell me:

Psa 72:5 They shall fear thee as long as the sun and moon endure, throughout all generations.

Psa 72:6 He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass: as showers that water the earth.

Psa 72:7 In his days shall the righteous flourish; and abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth.

A burnt offering was a gift of total surrender. Jesus has become my total surrender, forever, my door and your door to sanctuary:

Exo 29:42 a continual burnt offering throughout your generations at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation before the LORD: where I will meet you, to speak there unto thee.

Nothing can separate us from His total commitment to us:

Rom 8:33 Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God's elect? It is God that justifieth.

Rom 8:34 Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us.

Rom 8:35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

Rom 8:36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

Rom 8:37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us!

Exo 29:43 And there I will meet with the children of Israel, and the tabernacle shall be sanctified by my glory.

And what is God's glory?

Isa_44:23 Sing, O ye heavens; for the LORD hath done it: shout, ye lower parts of the earth: break forth into singing, ye mountains, O forest, and every tree therein: for the LORD hath redeemed Jacob, and glorified himself in Israel.

God glories in redeeming those who have been separated! In fact he gives us these two verses of strong comfort about our weaknesses and sins before he even says that:

Isa 44:21 Remember these, O Jacob and Israel; for thou art my servant: I have formed thee; thou art my servant: O Israel, thou shalt not be forgotten of me.

Isa 44:22 I have blotted out, as a thick cloud, thy transgressions, and, as a cloud, thy sins: return unto me; for I have redeemed thee.

This verse actually sounds to me like it's God's glory to lift away things like depression:

Isa_61:3 To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified.

The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness! What a promise! Do I have to take off my spirit of heaviness all by myself? No. He gives me beauty for ashes, oil of joy (for mourning,) the garment of praise.

I love the way God addresses Satan in Zechariah:

Zec 3:2 And the LORD said unto Satan, The LORD rebuke thee, O Satan; even the LORD that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?

There Satan is, "standing at his right hand to resist", and God is rebuking him. And God dresses Joshua like He dressed Adam and Eve:

Zec 3:3-5 Now Joshua was clothed with filthy garments, and stood before the angel.

And he answered and spake unto those that stood before him, saying, Take away the filthy garments from him. And unto him he said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with change of raiment.

And I said, Let them set a fair mitre upon his head. So they set a fair mitre upon his head, and clothed him with garments. And the angel of the LORD stood by.

We can by faith see that God is going to take away the spirit of heaviness and give us new clothes, the garment of praise. Time spent in prayer, right when I feel the heaviest, the dirtiest, the most inadequate, that is time spent with a Friend who can and will clothe with new clothes!

Isa 44:23 Sing, O ye heavens; for the LORD hath done it: shout, ye lower parts of the earth: break forth into singing, ye mountains, O forest, and every tree therein: for the LORD hath redeemed Jacob, and glorified himself in Israel.

Amen. And He will dress anyone. Even me. I don't have to focus on my heavy rags now, trying to tear them off--I don't have to talk about only the best rags I am wearing, hoping to head off notice of others. I can talk about Him, but first the thing is to look to Him quietly.

I'm learning to give Him time, to look up, look up. Redemption means He died and rose to give my heart a rising that I don't deserve and can't deserve! I, His brand plucked from the fire, can look to Him and have my adoring love more than accepted! He wore my heavy rags, he knows my sorrows. It's okay to tell Him all about it, He understands.

And he tells me DO NOT GIVE UP! Hey, I can turn the TV off, (maybe even 3abn, lol) I can put away the things that I thought eased my mind (away from His hope, actually) and just be in and with Him. Then I also remember, others do not own me. He does.

Others do not have the final say about you and what's going on with your saving, not your boss, your parent, your spouse or children or neighbors, your, your--whoever that is. They don't have the right to make you rejected. I don't care if they are the best people in the world. Jesus once said to Peter, "Get thee behind me Satan" (Mark 8:33) and God/man will rebuke anyone who tries to snatch me out of His hands and the safety I have there:

Zec 3:2 And the LORD said unto Satan, The LORD rebuke thee, O Satan; even the LORD that hath chosen Jerusalem rebuke thee: is not this a brand plucked out of the fire?

Jesus is my boss now. And not just the boss! He's Immanuel, the Forever Close Friend! Even church people don't have the right to measure us and call us wanting when He is our all in all. I have on His clothes. It's not really about church, when it comes to that.

Acts 7:47-50 where mentions that Solomon built God a house. But goes on to say it's not all about the house. It says "Howbeit the Most High dwelleth not in houses made with hands; as saith the prophet . . ."

And it's not about being outside of church either. Joh 4:21 Jesus saith unto her, Woman, believe me, the hour cometh, when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem, worship the Father.

God has a message where we are. Paul described people that are good but don't say they know God, when he talked from a philosophers hangout named Mars Hill, and he talks to my heart from there now:

Act 17:22-25 And Paul stood in the midst of the Areopagus, and said, Ye men of Athens, in all things I perceive that ye are somewhat superstitious.

For as I passed along, and observed the objects of your worship, I found also an altar with this inscription, TO AN UNKNOWN GOD. What therefore ye worship in ignorance, this set I forth unto you.

The God that made the world and all things therein, he, being Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands;

neither is he served by men's hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things;

Paul said, "he himself giveth to all life, and breath, and all things".

Paul knew the God that lifts even the worst of (Pharasaic) sinners like Saul was, up to serve in the way God really wants like Paul did! God has great things in store!

I have personally got some heavy rags.

I don't want to focus on my rags, however beautiful or ugly other people think they might be, I know what they are, but I focus on my God, because He loves me.

"Jesus loves me, this I know." That's the most exquisite symphonic, and the gentlest folk song I have ever heard! I love you this I know, too, only because he is love in and for and through and around my ragged little self and I can finally forget me!

Sometimes native poets have had it really right, you know. They talk about walking in beauty, and maybe they don't know that Beauty is also in human form, walks humanity's painful dusty roads with us, stretches out his hands in real love--but they are coming to the most beautiful of ideas anyway.

Whoever understands the breathtaking beauty of the God that made us, even if they don't know much about God, is getting it. God doesn't see the boundaries of blood and nations anyway, he's not fenced off in creeds and kingdoms, he speaks to any heart that catches the glory of this:

Act 17:26-28 And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; That they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from every one of us: For in him we live, and move, and have our being; (as certain also of your own poets have said,) For we are also his offspring.

Now there are some religious ideas we all have pretty much partaken of that don't quite express the idea we need here. We may think we have to walk a mile or make a monument, to devise a godlike way to God, but God isn't like that:

Act 17:29 Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device.

And the judgment itself, wow, that is a topic a lot of people can get wound up about! But I hear assurance in this:

Act 17:31 Because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by man whom he hath ordained;he hath given assurance unto all in that he hath raised him from the dead.

This is the assurance in the judgment, and in any religious topic, for me: God created perfection, and raised perfection from the very grave! God will take care of me, He will take care of you, God will take care of us! This very day, o'er all the way, He WILL take care of me!

I love this verse, and oddly it's a verse that scared me when I was a little girl:

Heb 8:1, 2 Now in the things which we are saying the chief point is this: We have such a high priest, who sat down on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, a minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, not man.

I was afraid because I thought the throne of the Majesty of God meant scathing judgment. I thought that so strongly that I couldn't even see who was on that throne for me or understand what God does!

Gen 3:9 And the LORD God called unto the man, and said unto him, Where art thou?

Luk 15:13, 17-20 And not many days after the younger son gathered all together, and took his journey into a far country; and there he wasted his substance with riotous living. . . But when he came to himself he said . . . I will arise and go to my father! . . . And he arose, and came to his father. But while he was yet afar off, his father saw him, and was moved with compassion, and ran, and fell on his neck, and kissed him.

And notice! God didn't kiss and then make him "like one of thy hired servants". The hired servants may slave for the master and say "Lo, these many years do I serve thee," (like the older brother mistakenly does in v. 29.) What the father does for the runaway is so different from what the longing weary heart expects!

Luk 15:22-25 But the father said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe, and put it on him; and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet: And bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it; and let us eat, and be merry: For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found. And they began to be merry. Now his elder son was in the field: and as he came and drew nigh to the house, he heard musick and dancing.

I hope you understand that I'm not preaching, couldn't if I even tried, I'm just a regular woman and not even a deaconess! I'm just sort of twirling in this, being merry with my friends--and it's the best thing I have to give.

Bless you, all of you, and happy Sabbath,

Kathy

[debbym]

Quote:

We can by faith see that God is going to take away the spirit of heaviness and give us new clothes, the garment of praise. Time spent in prayer, right when I feel the heaviest, the dirtiest, the most inadequate, that is time spent with a Friend who can and will clothe with new clothes!

Isa 44:23 Sing, O ye heavens; for the LORD hath done it: shout, ye lower parts of the earth: break forth into singing, ye mountains, O forest, and every tree therein: for the LORD hath redeemed Jacob, and glorified himself in Israel.

...

Others do not have the final say about you and what's going on with your saving, not your boss, your parent, your spouse or children or neighbors, your, your--whoever that is. They don't have the right to make you rejected. I don't care if they are the best people in the world. Jesus once said to Peter, "Get thee behind me Satan" (Mark 8:33) and God/man will rebuke anyone who tries to snatch me out of His hands and the safety I have there:

I would be happy to hear this message from the pulpit anytime.

Thank-you for speaking from your heart.

What a great treat to prepare my heart for the Sabbath.

[whatisthis]

None of what I've said above actually says that women should be ordained to be church pastors. We do have a role in ministering, God has promised every man or woman or child who consecrates their lives to Him a role. I'm not ready to say I know all the answers here, at all.

[whatisthis]

I think "twirling" wasn't actually the right word either. I want to go forward with gladly measured steps. Somehow I've taken a few words and misled the wonderful import of all these verses.

[debbym]

the word of God speaks for itself,

i don't think you can detract from the message easily.

Blessings kathy