JULY 12 "FROM GREAT JUBILATION TO DOWNRIGHT SORROW"

Sometimes the most joyous of occasions are met with disappointment and grief, so much so, that I'm often to get too excited about anything. David makes a decision to bring back the Arc of the Covenant, to Jerusalem. This is a festive celebration with great fanfare and David is in high spirits, until the Arc wobbles, Uzzah reaches out to stabilize it and gets killed.  The Bible tells us, "And David became angry that day".  Was he angry or was he festive?  Was he in a good mood or a foul mood? Was this a good day or a bad day?   I remember some years ago, my neighborhood and I did I festive Christmas Trailer Caroling around our block.  Many of us were on the trailer, sitting on the hay, drinking hot cocoa and singing Carols and others were alongside, walking with us.  It was quite a festive occasion, everyone was in high spirits, until one of the kids got his leg under the moving trailer and the trailer went right over it.  The kid screamed his head off, the driver pulling the trailer stopped.  He heard he had ran over the boy, so what did he do? He reversed and ran over the boys leg again. The boys leg snapped and broke in two. The festive occasion came to a screeching half, from joy to sadness, from jubilation to anger. How could God allow such a thing to happen as we were going around singing Christmas Carols, how could such a celebratory occasion turn so awful. I don't know, ask David. David left the Arc and gave up the cause. David is most definitely a relative of ours. Because we do the same. We set out with such great enthusiasm in the things of life, but often allow ourselves to be slapped down. We allow our mood to turn from joy to sadness, happy to angry, optimist to pessimist. The Arc ended up with Obed-Edom and the Bible tells us he was blessed, not David.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

NOVEMBER 6 "DOES GOD STILL DO MIRACLES?"

 The Psalmist writes, "who can list the glorious miracles of the Lord!" I dare say, there are some reading this blog that might challenge that!"  They would say, "list them, I'm hard pressed to think of one! How'' your miracle life? Miracles go hand in hand with opportunity. We have our lives so structured and we don't venture out in faith, we keep it safe. Well then don't complain you have no miracles. Peter had to step out of the boat to experience a miracle, but don't forget there was a handful of other disciples that stayed in the boat, safe and experienced no miracle! You can have it both ways.  Christians who venture, in faith, are the ones that have the "lists of miracles" to write about.   "Does God still do miracles? In your intellect you say, "yes of course", but in your heart what do you say? God does miracle, yes! Does He do miracles for you? Do you encourage others to believe in miracles and now you need ...
Read more

NOVEMBER 21 "CLASS WARFARE IS AN UGLY THING"

     There’s no denying, James is not that fond of “rich people”.  If it was only this reference in Chapter 5, that would be bad enough, but James has taken jabs at the rich in other chapters as well. No doubt, James did not grow up with affluence of any kind. We know from the Gospels that Joseph and Mary (James’ parents) were poor. Historians believe that Joseph died at an early age, as he is not mentioned in the Gospels; except in the early stages of Jesus’ life. Now with Joseph dead, James & Jesus, probably had to work that much harder to make ends meet at home. Jesus himself takes a jab at rich people saying, “ it is easier for a camel to get through the eye of an needle than for a rich person to get into heaven ”.  I’m sure in the  Church  of  Jerusalem  where James was an elder, there were not many affluent people in that congregation. However we cannot deny that it was Joseph of Arimathea, an affluent man , a prominent member of th...
Read more

FEBRUARY 8 "ABANDONED IN MY TIME OF NEED"

   This may end up being one of the greater indictments against The Church of Jesus Christ at our judgement; that we abandoned our brothers and sisters in their most dire time of need. In our reading today, the Psalmist eludes to a time of great anguish in his life and because of this his strength is failing; he then goes on to say concerning his friends, "I am a dread to my friends....I am forgotten by them". Unfortunately, it is when we are not at our best that our brothers and sisters in Christ seem to get turned off by us and often abandon us when we need them the most! Why is that? Is it because of selfish reasons, after all, who doesn't want to hang around upbeat people full of joy and victory, but are there not times that we need to also grieve with those that are grieving?! Another reason is their weakness probably turns us off, "why are you even struggling with this ....what's wrong with you!!?" Thence, we're turned off and leave them to struggl...
Read more