I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go;
I will counsel you with my eye upon you.
Be not like a horse or a mule, without understanding,
which must be curbed with bit and bridle, or it will not stay near you.
Psalms 32:8-9
We just came from talking about how our God is as a Father to us – One who is supportive, precise, present and mindful to us. We came to the realization that such a God is so detailed in His love for us, that He knows all there is to know about us, and cares for us anyway. He knows all that’s going on with us at any given moment, and Christ has guaranteed that He is as close to us as He could ever be, never being any further away from us. We’ve talked about how the same God was complete in creating everything that there was that was created, and He was very specific in even the smallest details regarding our being – keeping this in mind, and considering everything else we’ve tackled so far, we have a far broader picture of just how much our God is our Father, and our supportive Father, at that – Much so that He is very detailed and complete in His support for us.
You know I really wasn’t supposed to do a recap, but after seeing the verses as stated above, I couldn’t help but indulge. Because of Christ we can count on no less than the Creator of the Universe, who is now our Father, to instruct us – and not only to instruct us, but to instruct us completely, fully aware of who we are and what we’re going through at any given moment. He teaches each and every one of us in the way we should go – Whenever we hear directions from Him, we know they’ll come from Him.
And so our Father is for us, that He instructs us. Our Father is not against us, in that we would definitely know when He teaches us in the way we should go. But on top of all of this, He would humble Himself so much to keep His eye upon us, to observe our reactions and our responses, as He lovingly counsels us.
We really can trust Him, folks. He listens when we pray, and He is mindful to us when we consult His word. Never let it be said among all of us who discuss Christ and His finished work together, that we are not with Him – No, Christ’s birth, death, resurrection and ascension has ensured that our Father is with us all the time, even unto the end of time and beyond.
Let us therefore revel in the Spirit that He has poured out upon us, the Spirit of Understanding; The Spirit of Power, Love, and Sound Judgment. Let us enjoy His instruction, and be mindful of His love for us, even in discipline.
Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the LORD.
Be glad in the LORD, and rejoice, O righteous, and shout for joy, all you upright in heart!
Psalms 32:10-11
There’s that one song that goes along the lines of saying that it may seem as if we are surrounded, but the reality is we’re surrounded by God. If we are pinned down by the sorrows of the world, may the Spirit remind us that it is exactly during those times that we are fully engulfed, surrounded by God’s steadfast love. I dare say that contrary to our assumptions of God stepping away in times of trouble, the Truth is that He is as close to us as He could ever be, when we find ourselves in darkness.
We’re reminded in the darkness – The Holy Spirit reminds us that Christ has made us righteous, and therefore we can be glad in the absence of hope, just as we could rejoice fully in times of confusion. We’re reminded in times that would shake us – The Holy Spirit reminds us that we are upright in heart, standing on Christ who is our Firm Foundation; that we could shout for joy, even as the rest of the world only has reason to grieve.
We have Christ! Let us rejoice, and shout for joy!
Psalm 139 was always a go-to for me but this week I gave it some extra attention. Picking up from the US Oath of Office, my plan was to take Psalm 139 and dig deeper into how our God protects and defends us from domestic threats – that is, self-sabotaging words, and thoughts that we fabricate for ourselves that tear us apart from within. What I ended up with was a realization, a deeper revelation into who our God is; That is, He is more than our Creator, but He is our Father who supports us by being mindful, precise, and present with us.
I guess it’s not a total loss, because the point is turning out to be that, if we find ourselves being weighed down and assaulted internally, we shouldn’t focus on silencing ourselves or calming ourselves down, but we should just keep our eyes on our God. Yes, just as the snake-bitten Israelites looked upon the bronze serpent hanging on a pole and were healed, so we can also look up to Christ who hung on a cross for us to be saved.
The next step is to take a look at Psalm 140 in an attempt to have an idea of how God protects and defends us from foreign threats. Physical, mental, and/or spiritual assaults against us from the outside in. And I COULD go ahead and jump into it right now… but I think I should go back to the original series I had set for this July. Getting ahead of myself here, literally. Domestic and Foreign (Psalm 139, Psalm 140) can wait until I iron out my thoughts for this month.
And here’s a problem. What WAS I talking about for July, anyway? Let me try to pull out what I talked about so far.
We talked about God’s Will. We pulled up 2 Peter 3:9 and 1 Timothy 2:1-6, and I presented one perspective to God’s heart. It’s His will for us to know the Truth, for us to come to repentance – so we would not perish, but we would be saved.
I believe it was no accident that we went to the beach when we did, because that’s where we clarified the belief of Christ that we ought to share with and have with each other. Prior to our outing I shared that Christ died in our place – but this was corrected when we sought to establish what we believed when it came to baptism.
I agree that Christ died for us, but it’s not in the sense that Christ died in our place. Christ died for us, because by Him dying for us, our old self which was of sin and the flesh not only died, but was cut off from us.
Hold that thought and let’s go back to the will of God as we discussed – it not only mentioned that God’s will was for us not to perish, but for us to be saved. To that end I point out what we remember in baptism, when we are raised from the water – this was for us to remember that in Christ’s resurrection, so we also rose again… and we rose as new creations, righteous and therefore sure to have eternal life. To put it all together, Christ did God’s will by saving us. And Christ saved us by dying for us so we died, and rising again so we rose again, righteous unto eternal life.
Or if we were to see it from another angle, we can say that we publicly proclaim God’s Will in baptism. When we were immersed and raised, we acknowledge Christ dying and rising again, so we would not perish, but we would be saved. Christ saved us by doing God’s Will, perfectly. This is why we say that Christ HIMSELF is God’s Perfect Will. This is the Truth that leads us to repentance.
Now I was supposed to talk about Christ being our Firm Foundation, that Sunday after our church outing – but the message we shared in baptism was one that needed to be clarified and disseminated, one that took priority. We talked about the proposed Creed, one that I’m supposed to share from the top of my head:
We believe in God, Creator of the Heavens and the Earth, of all that is seen and unseen.
We believe in Jesus Christ, the only Begotten Son of God.
We believe in the birth, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ.
We believe that when Christ died, so we died – our old fleshly self has been buried, and sin has been circumcised and cut off from us.
We believe that when Christ rose again, so we rose again as new creations, righteous unto eternal life.
We believe that when Christ ascended into heaven, we received the Holy Spirit, and we now have the mind of Christ.
I’m putting this here before I go ahead and recall what I planned on talking about when trying to point out the essential truth of Christ being our Firm Foundation. I remember writing about how God was as a Foundation to the Israelites. Through the writer of Psalm 62 we read how they were not greatly shaken. And through Moses and Jehoshaphat we have seen that God reminded His people that they should stand firm.
God was a Rock to His people, in that they would not be greatly shaken, and that they would stand firm. In our case, we have something better – we have Jesus Christ, who Isaiah prophesied was the stone that the builders rejected, and has become the chief cornerstone. I read a little bit more on the significance of a cornerstone, and I saw how this was actually the first stone that was to be the basis of all measurements for the foundation the consequent building. In essence, when we say that Christ is the Cornerstone, we are saying that He is the Foundation of foundations!
And with this in mind, in light of what we’ve established after our baptism outing, I could now see more value in the bridge of Israel Houghton’s Still Standing, where he sings:
On Christ the Solid Rock I stand,
All other ground is sinking sand.
Friends, on a similar note, we were all on shaky ground, doomed to sink. Christ sunk and took us with Him, so that when He rose again He was established as the first stone, a Solid Rock and a sure foundation on whom we start building and re-building. And as we build, we have the Holy Spirit, and the mind of Christ.
Obviously I’m going to have to keep working on that, but I feel a little better now that I’m looking at this series I thought of, in the light of this… statement of belief, this Creed that we came up with as a supplement to our observing the rite of water baptism.
From here I was supposed to talk about how Christ is our Living Word and our Light, but seeing as we have material for this Sunday and the next, I think I could breathe a little bit deeper this time. Not that I’m going to be slacking, but I’m going to take on the remaining revelations with a more relaxed and hopefully a more effective and efficient outlook.
It just feels good to have everything plotted out so far forward, that I could focus on other things.
Anyway, yeah, I just thought I’d go ahead and update… myself, in all this. As usual I want to thank you for bearing with me. This was more for me, to be completely honest.
Until the next post, God bless you.
JB's Personal Brain Defragmenter 
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