A Heart Untroubled

In Isaiah 7, Judah is being threatened and Isaiah gets's a word from the Lord to go and meet Ahaz and share this message: TAKE HEED AND BE QUIET; FEAR NOT I think there is an important picture here for us today. Firstly, in your situation, 'take heed'. This is old phrase meaning 'to listen and follow'.  When we encounter challenges in our life the first thing to do, is listen.  So often we rush in with our own ideas and plans.  We need to stop and listen, then follow what God has to tell us. The second thing is to be quiet.  I remember a long time ago, the Holy Spirit very clearly told me to 'Shut Up'.. You may think 'that isn't the way God speaks', but I know it was God and it wasn't harsh, but it was most definitely what I needed to do at that moment. At another time in my life, the Holy Spirit told me to 'hold my peace'.  At first, I thought that He again meant me to be quiet, but I realized that 'holding my peace

Just a short thought today.  I was reading in Joshua.  The part in particular was where the people of Gibeon have heard of the Israelites defeat of the people of Ai and they know that they're likely to be next. So they cook up a plan to make it look like they've been travelling for ages.  They get old clothes, old shoes, old food and old wineskins. When they find Joshua they want to make a deal with Israel, a treaty. They show Joshua and the team all their stuff, and then it says in Joshua 9:14 they "...asked not the counsel at the mouth of the Lord" So often we go into a situation and we take in what we 'see'; only what we can take note of with our senses.  We look at natural evidence and we don't seek counsel from the Lord. How many times have we tried to find solutions by these method.  God's ways are higher than ours, and so when we look at a situation only from a natural perspective we are missing a whole dimension. It's not wise t

The preacher on Sunday posed a question during his sermon: Did the wise men plan to bow down and worship Jesus?  Actually the answer is in scripture, because they told Herod that they had come in search of the new-born King so that they could worship him (Matt 2:2), but that got me thinking.  Their worship was intentional, and they weren't even Jews!  They had heard of the King of the Jews and had come in a deliberate plan with gifts to worship Him. I've heard it said that the wise men may have been from the place where Daniel (as in the lions den) had resided.  His legacy to the Babylonians may have been to tell them all he knew of the prophecies of a coming saviour.  If that is the case, these men may have been scouring the skies for some time, waiting to see how it all would unfold. Whether that is true or not, these men came looking for Jesus; they came with gifts, and planning to worship him. Sometimes I've met people who would call themselves 'Christians

Welcome to 2019!   This is my first blog this year.  I am excited and looking forward with a confident expectation of what God has in store for me.  As we started this year, I wondered what the significance of '19' is.   In Hebrew, every number has meaning.   So 7 means perfection and 8 new beginning etc. The number '19' is associated with the preaching of the word and the faith-response to that word. That actually perfectly sums up our Christian life.   It is always about that! By Grace you are saved through faith ( Eph 2:8) It’s always about God’s provision and then our response to that. What makes us ineffective as believers is two-fold then is 1)      Ignorance of what God’s word says and therefore of God’s provision 2)     Not mixing it with faith Paul talks in many of his letters about being ignorant (lacking knowledge or awareness) of many things.  There’s a reason that we’re not supposed to be ignorant – because how c