Seeds For Thinking

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Scripture: “You will guide me with your counsel, and afterward receive me to glory.” (Psalm 73:24, NKJV)

Sometimes we need a little help finding our way. Imagine what it would be like to try to find a chosen destination in a location where there are no street names, no building numbers, and no maps to guide you.
The LORD led the people on the Exodus with His own GPS - God’s Positioning Service - as they traveled through the wilderness. A pillar of cloud led the way by day, and a pillar of fire gave them light by night. ( Exodus 13:21)
Navigators - navel and airborne - lacking such heavenly accommodations, long ago developed methods of using compass readings, a chronometer (clock), and sightings of the sun and stars to determine latitude and longitude, thus, their position on the earth’s surface. Surveyors used similar methods on land.
Navigational skills and knowledge require study and practice to develop accuracy. Let’s face it - we don’t want to be at the mercy of someone responsible for guiding us to a chosen port, whether sea or air, who hasn’t mastered navigation.
Naming cities and streets, assigning numbers to highways and building locations, and publishing maps and directories helps even us ordinary travelers, but it is still a chore to navigate in unfamiliar territory. Enter the new navigational technology - the Global Positioning System (GPS).
A GPS system uses signals from orbiting satellites to determine latitude and longitude anywhere on earth - and even above the earth. The latest commercial units are feature-packed marvels that can direct you to a chosen location, show a map of streets and roads, indicate the speed limit and the speed of the vehicle, and calculate the arrival time, among other data. Many have search options for finding rest stops, service stations, restaurants, and more. All in a little package about the size of a deck of playing cards!
Consider that someone had to collect and assemble all of that information. The GPS may pluck the geographic coordinates seemingly “out of the air” from those satellites, but those basic data have to be interfaced with the display screen. From satellite to screen, it seems to me that God is still playing a major role, providing the physics, science, and source of the intellect behind it all.
Another “early” GPS system was in use at the birth of Jesus - the star in the heavens that pointed the way to the manger bed of the Christ Child.
A more important form of God’s Positioning System appeared, manifesting the Divine Presence in the tabernacle, and later, in the temple (2 Chronicles 5:13). As noted by the psalmist, “You will guide me with your counsel, and afterward receive me to glory.” (Psalm 73:24)
Jesus, the Christ, has set the example of the ultimate GPS. As is written in Hebrews, 12:1, “we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.” (New King James Version).
The satellite-based GPS unit is a very handy device to guide us while traveling, but we need God’s Positioning Service to guide us to avoid sin and reach the reward of His presence in glory.

Link: http://seedsforthinking.oldgleaner.com/

* Gehenna
* Scripture: Jesus said, "Serpents, brood of vipers, how can you escape the condemnation of hell?” (Matthew, 23:33, NKJV)

There is a valley near the city of Jerusalem that has been known for centuries as the “Valley of the Son(s) of Hinnom,” (Joshua 15:16) and is still called Gai Ben Hinnom in Modern Hebrew. The name became associated with an abomination when King Ahaz burned incense there, and burned his children in the fire, following the customs of the nations who lived in Caanan prior to the Hebrew conquest. (2 Chronicles 28:3; 33:6)
The practice of child sacrifice was associated with the pagan god Molech and the fire pits were known as “Topheth” in Hebrew. Priests would bang on drums so that the father would not hear the groans of the child when he would be burned by the hands of the pagan image, Molech. It can well be understood why God became angry with the people participating in Tophet. He spoke through the prophet, Jeremiah, (19:6) “Therefore, behold days are coming, says the Lord, when this place will no longer be called Topheth, or the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter.” Look up other references in a good Bible dictionary, such as the passage in Isaiah 30:33, of fire kindled by the Lord.
King Josiah defiled Topheth (2 Kings 23:10) by turning the valley into a garbage dump for the city of Jerusalem; refuse included the bodies of executed criminals, and the carcasses of animals. The Son of Hinnom’s Valley became a place of perpetual fire, and a byword for a place of torment.
Gai Ben Hinnom became shortened to Gai-Hinnom in rabbinical texts, or Gehinnom. The Greek texts of the New Testament used the word “Gehenna,” often used as a synonym for Hell in modern translations.
Hades is a related word, meaning the underworld, or abode of the dead, similar to Hebrew Sheol, but not usually a place of punishment.
Hell is, according to many religious beliefs, a place or a state of painful suffering. The English word 'hell' comes from the Teutonic 'Hel', which originally meant "to cover" and later referred to the goddess of the Norse underworld, Helgardh.
Jesus used the word Gehenna, not hell, and his audience understood quite well that Gehenna meant a place of condemnation, where Jews had previously cast aside the worship of the true God to defile themselves by committing abominations. Human garbage, sinners, would be consumed and destroyed forever.
Think about it!
November 6, 2005

Link: http://seedsforthinking.oldgleaner.com

Scripture: The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.” (Genesis 3:13b, NKJV)

A few years ago, as I recall, a tag line in a skit on a popular television show was, “The devil made me do it!” Sure, it brought laughs, but it begs the question of why we should be listening to the devil at all.
The woman (Eve) was the first to use that line, according to Genesis. The serpent, of course, was Satan, the adversary. His advice sounds like such a simple matter: Go ahead, eat that fruit. “Your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
Satan (the devil) often appeals to our physical desires, in this case, food. It was good to eat. Adam and Eve could see the tree in the garden, and the pleasant-looking fruit that grew upon it. It looks delectable; it is desirable. It has the potential to make them wise.
Convinced of the serpent’s credibility, Eve ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. Adam doesn’t use the devil as an excuse, but does use the role of accuser: “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.” (Genesis 3:12)
Now turn to the Gospel of Mark, Chapter 9. Jesus warns that giving in to temptation, and entering into sin, leads to hell - where “Their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched.” (Mark 9:44)
Jesus was referring to the trash dump in the Valley of Hinnom - Gehenna. Initially the site where idolatrous Jews sacrificed their children to the god Molech (2 Chr. 28:3, 33:6; Jer. 7:31, 19:2-6), the valley later became the common wasteyard for all the refuse of Jerusalem. Here the dead bodies of animals and of criminals, and rubbish, were cast and consumed by a constant fire. In time it became the image of the place of everlasting destruction in Jewish tradition.
Eve credited the serpent - Satan - for leading her astray. Couldn’t she just as well have blamed her hand, which reached out and plucked that fruit? “Well, LORD, my hand made me do it!”
Or, suppose that a pick pocket thief is caught in the act, is hauled into court, and enters a plea of “Not Guilty, your honor.” And why not? “Well, your honor, my Hand made me do it.” We might not like the idea of cutting off a thief’s hand, but it is used in some countries.
Yes, Mark relates that Jesus advises, “If your hand causes you to sin, cut it off.” (Mark 9:43a) I’m sure that many people, like myself, have pondered, and been troubled by, these words. But wouldn’t that be an appropriate retort: “Your hand made you do it (sin)? Then cut it off.
The fact is, it is not possible to overcome sin by mutilating one’s body. Cutting off a hand, a foot, or plucking out an offending eye will not save anyone from the fires and worms of hell. (Read the rest of Mark 9:43-50)
Blaming the devil, your hand, your foot, or your eye is no excuse for sin.
Salvation from sin comes only through the Grace of God. Whosoever believes in the only begotten Son of God shall not perish, but have eternal life - in the kingdom of God, where there are no worms or an unquenchable fire.

Link: http://seedsforthinking.oldgleaner.com/

Scripture: Sermon on the Mount - Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith. (Mt.6:30 , NKJV)

Let’s talk about the necessity of eating, or at least the preparation of food.
My ever-ready dictionary(1) quotes this proverb, “Necessity is the mother of invention.” Necessity: “When the need for something becomes imperative, (and) you are forced to find ways of getting or achieving it; a state of things or circumstances enforcing a certain course.”
First, I will assume that most of my readers prepare (or have prepared) portions of their meals by heating them in some manner. Typically called a stove, range, grill or oven, the device is heated by burning a fuel or by electricity, available at the mere twist of a knob. Consider that if you lived in Palestine in Jesus’ time, neither gas nor electricity would be available as a heat source. Faced with the necessity of cooking your food, you would be forced to find ways of getting or achieving a substance for heating that stove.
In research for this topic, I find that, even today, about 50% of the world's households rely on wood, stubble, dung, and grass for cooking fuel. The clue as to what you will likely use for fuel is found in Mt. 6:30. Grass! Why not wood? Well, some wood, surely, but only from trimmings of trees and vines. However, deforestation and erosion are often the end result of harvesting wood for cooking fuel. Forests seem to have been long-gone from Palestine by Jesus’ day. Both your stove and your fire would likely be as as small and efficient as possible to conserve that precious fuel.
Settlers moving into the Great Plains area of the American west in the 19th century encountered vast areas that had no trees, but grass was plentiful. And someone discovered that "chips" - that is, droppings from either cows or buffaloes that had dried in the sun - burned pretty well in the stoves. A typical fall activity for settlers included spending two or three weeks gathering chips before the onset of winter. (2)
Ponder this insight into cooking with “Necessity.” (3)
“Women had to overcome the distaste they felt not only for gathering (dung), but bringing it into the home and cooking with it. Chips and hay twists both burned hot but quickly. Maintaining even minimal standards of cleanliness around a chip-fired stove was a chore. Because this kind of fuel burned quickly and produced a lot of ash, there was a standing joke in the sand hills of Nebraska - A visitor asked a settler how his family was. The settler replied that the children were all right, but he hardly knew about his wife since theirs was a "passing acquaintance." He said, "We see each other, but only as she is going out with a pan of ashes and as I am coming in with a bucket of cow chips. It keeps both of us on the go to keep from freezing. With all the hustle and bustle, we have no time for idle visiting." ”
Worried about what you will eat, or how you will cook it? Jesus said, “Therefore do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ . . . For your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.” (Mt. 6:31, NKJV)

(1) Oxford American Dictionary,
Version 1.0.2 (1.0.2)

(2)(From a Nebraska State Internet web site)
http://www.neo.ne.gov/summer98/Sum98_07.htm
(3)http://www.nebraskastudies.org/0500/frameset_reset.html?http://www.nebraskastudies.org/0500/stories/0501_0110.html

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