Seeds For Thinking

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Scripture: “ There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galations 3:28, NKJV)

After learning the numbers, and how to count with them, we learn about “equals.” 1+2=3; 3+4=7, and so on. It is plain to see that the digits on either side of that equal sign may signify equity, but they are obviously not identical. Each number is distinct in its own right, however balanced they may be in the equation.
I have been thinking about how that plays out in the social, as well as the mathematical world. We are reminded in many ways how you and I share equality - created equal, have equal rights, equal opportunities, and all that. My point is, equal does not mean identical. We are not indistinguishable, one from the other, or exactly the same, uniform, and interchangeable.
Where this matters most, it seems to me, is how God looks upon His children.
“ There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” (Galations 3:28, NKJV) There is no favoritism on account of birth, beauty, or blood. There is no truth, as some claim, that certain people are the favorites of heaven, in virtue of their birth or their rank in life, or that they have special facilities for salvation.
Paul affirms, “For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.” Individuals on one side of that “equals” sign, and one Spirit, one body on the other. (1 Corinthians 12:13) It is the same God that works all in all. God so loved the world - every individual - that everyone who believes will be part of that one Body, one Spirit; “But the manifestation of the Spirit is given to every man to profit with.” (1 Corinthians 12:7)
Consider: “There was a man sent from God, whose name was John. The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe. He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.” (John 1:6-8) John had a unique role; he stood out as an individual, as described by Mark (1:1-8) but made no claims as to his relationship to the Light. When asked about his identity, John replied, “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as the prophet Isaiah said.” (1:23)
Later, after Jesus began His ministry, John again responded to questions about his role in the kingdom of God; saying, “A man can receive nothing, except it be given him from heaven. You yourselves bear me witness, that I said, I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before him. He that has the bride is the bridegroom: but the friend of the bridegroom, which stands and hears him, rejoices greatly because of the bridegroom's voice: this my joy therefore is fulfilled. He must increase, but I must decrease.” (John 3:27-30)
John inquired from prison as to whether Jesus was the Coming One. Jesus praised John highly, but added, “ . . . But he who is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than (John.)” (See Matthew 11:2-15) He who is least, even I? How can that be? Individuals on one side of that “equals” sign, and one Spirit, one body on the other.
As summed up by “The Preacher” of Ecclesiastes, “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is man’s all. For God will bring every work into judgment, including every secret thing, whether good or evil.” Ecc. 12:13-14)
Psalm 9:8 states, “He shall judge the world in righteousness, and He shall administer judgment for the peoples in uprightness.”
God will balance the equation, bringing into the “one body, one Spirit” even the least of those who believe in Him. (John 3:16)

Seeds for Thinking (©) 1996 - 2010 by Leland Hubbell

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

* Advent
* Scripture: Paul wrote, “For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed to us. (Romans 8:18, NKJV)

Come, Thou long expected Jesus, . . .
Hope of all the earth thou art;
Dear desire of every nation,
Joy of every longing heart. (C. Wesley)

Longing, anticipation, and expectation, the root of hope, the expectation of future good. Looking back, we find many peoples living in times of trial and suffering, typified by the words of the Lord to Moses at his calling; “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters.” (Exodus 3:7)
It is the cry of those who have experienced the tyranny of injustice in a world under the curse of sin, and yet who have hope of deliverance by a God who has heard the cries of oppressed slaves and brought deliverance!
It was such a time, oppressed by brutal rulers, dominated by a foreign empire, that moved the Apostle John to write of a light coming to illuminate the darkness, the ‘True Light,’ “which gives light to every man coming into the world.” (John 1:9) John is only one of many bearing witness to that Light.
“And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us . . .full of grace and truth.” (John 1:14) The ‘Incarnation’ - the union of divinity with humanity in Jesus Christ. The coming into being, The Advent. For many Christians, Advent marks the beginning of the church year, the period beginning four Sundays before Christmas and observed by some Christians as a season of prayer and fasting.
John makes an important distinction, affirmed by Paul, who wrote that all creation groans for its redemption as we witness the evil that so dominates our world (Rom 8:18-25). The sufferings of oppression and injustice, the systemic evil of the world expressed in evil empires and tyrants “are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed to us.”.
The Word became flesh, that as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God. And as children of God, heirs of the glory to come.
While some church traditions focus on penitence during Advent, for others, Advent is celebrated as a time of joy and happiness awaiting the coming of the King.
November 27, 2005

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* Relationships
* Scripture: James wrote, “Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.” James 4:8, NKJV

I suppose that if I were to ask people to define the main theme of the Bible, the overwhelming majority would say “God” or “Jesus.” To take nothing from the prominence of The Deity, my response will be “Relationships.” Please allow me to share my reasoning with you.
Suppose that I tell you that a magnificent rock formation forms the focal point of a vast, trackless desert. You may well say, “So?”
I persist; “It is unlike anything you have ever seen. You really should go to see it for yourself.” Yielding slightly, you may ask where it is located. Should I say, “Australia,” you could rightly comment that Australia is not only far away, but is also a very large country.
“OK,” I say. “I’ll show you a map of how to get there,” and talk about distance and direction, all of which will of course be in relation to some point and to where you are at the moment. Relationships.
Conceding that such a trip may not be within reality, I may throw in a picture so that you can see for yourself the wonders that I proclaim. Again, I need to include some references about substance, length, breadth and height, and how it may compare to anything found elsewhere in the world. Relationships.
God is Infinite, All-powerful, All-Knowing, All-Seeing, All-Hearing. He is known as the “Great I Am.” God “IS!” How do we describe the indescribable? What more to say?
He is the Creator of all that exists; That is a relationship. He wants to be our God, and we are to be His People. That is a relationship.
Think about all that is contained in the Bible. The very commandments proclaim not only God, but the relationship between all things in creation, living and nonliving. Jesus sums up the commandments in Matthew 22:36-40 by stating that a certain relationship should exist between God and ourselves, and between ourselves and our neighbor. The truth of the Parable of the Good Samaritan lies not in who of the three men passing along that Jericho road believes in God, but in who has a Godly relationship with his ‘neighbor.’
Again, it is our relationship to the least of His Children and our response brought about from that relationship that is important, (Mt. 25:31-46).
Suppose that you are sitting in a room which darkens as the daylight ebbs. You are there, the darkness is there, and a light switch is located across the room. To bring illumination (light) into your life, you need to do something about your relationship to that light switch. Get up, move that relationship close enough that you can turn on the power.
Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.
August 14, 2005

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* Light
* Scripture: Paul wrote, “for it is light that makes everything visible. This is why it is said, “Wake up, O sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.” Ephesian 5:14,NIV

The sunlight streaming through the window was warming and soothing, belying the fact that it was a bone-chilling -4º on the other side of the window pane. The mid-winter day brought into play an interesting paradox. The source of that intense light and warmth was over 93 million miles away, yet closer to the earth than in the scorching days of mid-summer. So it is not the distance to the sun that matters in terms of heating the earth. Something else is at work here.
Scientists tell us it is the angle at which the sun’s rays strike the earth which determines the amount of heating taking place. During the chilly winter months, the angle of incidence produces less heating, the sun hanging low in the heavens even at noon. Well, this is only a half-truth; what is true for one hemisphere of our global home, is just the opposite at the other extreme. Winter in the northern climes is summer “down under.”
Further, the polar regions of the earth experience either a midnight sun, or days where the sun hangs low, hugging the horizon, bringing almost perpetual night.
Another aspect of sunlight that is the seeming delight of physicists concerns what is seen and what we do not see. We are familiar with the unique display of colors in a rainbow, ranging from the reds through the blues to violet. The heating effects come not from what we do see, the bright, almost blinding illumination we call sunlight, but that portion of the energy spectrum called the infra-red region. It is felt, not seen.
As I enjoyed the warmth of that mid-winter sun penetrating into my aging bones, I thought of the many parallels to the One who created the sun. There is so much more unseen, and so much more unknown about our relationship with God, that it boggles the mind to contemplate it.
There are times when we seem to be the most distant from God, when He appears invisible to us, that prove to provide the deep warmth that our soul requires. We crave illumination, we want blinding insights, but, just like sunlight, that may not be what we need at that moment.
I noted that if I moved only a few inches from the direct sunlight into the shadow, I felt chilled by the contrast, even though the actual room temperature was the same. The sun didn’t move - I did, and the contrast was most evident. If I want the warmth, I have to stay in the sun light. I think the same is true of Son-light.
We have to awake, place our soul in the proper relationship to Christ if we want those deep, warming, rays of Son-light to deliver us from the shadows and bone-chilling darkness of the Godless world.
January 23, 2005

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Scripture: The Psalmist wrote, “O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!” Psalms 8:1, NIV

As I sat in the doctor’s office recently, my attention was drawn to a beam of sunlight streaming through a gap in the venetian blind. The morning sun painted a band of brilliant light downward across the northern wall, then made a ninety degree angle at the wall opposite the window, making an awesome pointer for a celestial clock. As I watched, the beam slowly moved, as I knew it would. Downward, ever downward, it crept past the doorstop, which provided a convenient reference point.
Sitting near the otherwise shaded window, I could also feel the heat gradually warming the glass and radiating through the blind. The building would occasionally “murmur” as the materials expanded from the sun's potent rays, though the source of that light and heat energy was ninety-three million miles away.
It had moved several inches by the time the doctor came in. I noted the position of the sunbeam again as I prepared to leave; it now pointed at the baseboard near the floor. How true, the words of the Teacher, “The sun rises and the sun sets, and hurries back to where it rises.” (Ecc. 1:5)
The newly created earth was formless and empty, according to Genesis, and darkness was over the waters. God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. It is interesting that God did not create the “two great lights” until later. Read Genesis Chapter 1 and see whether you think the “greater light” that governed the day is the sun, and the “lesser light” that governed the night is the moon. (Genesis 1:16) If so, the source of the light on the first day must have been from God Himself. What do you think?
I turn often to the 8th Psalm, and read

“When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set into place,
what is man, that you are mindful of him,
the son of man that care for him?

Psalm 74:16 also affirms the creator God;

“The day is yours, and yours also the night;
you established the sun and moon.”

Many peoples over time have worshiped the sun. Not so the followers of Jehovah God; rather, we must worship the creator, and not anything created. Revue Exodus 20, especially verse4:
“You shall not make for yourself an idol in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.”
The Bible records that the sun once delayed going down for a full day as recorded in Joshua 10:13. See if you can find other Biblical miracles concerning the sun.
Enjoy the day that the Lord has made, and the night too! He did it for you.
October 12, 2003

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Scripture: Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. Genesis 1:3, NKJV)

Light! Created by God, dividing Day from Night, and the light was good. But what is light, exactly? It is far easier to define darkness as the absence of light than to define how light works. Scientists and physicists still struggle to explain something that we take so much for granted.
A further reading of Genesis has intrigued scholars, as well. God created light during the first day, then turned it off at night. But the lights in the heavens, the sun, moon, and stars, were not created until the fourth day. Some have postulated that the original light came directly from God; God’s light will be part of the New Jerusalem: “The city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light.” (Rev. 21:23, NKJV)
Vision is perhaps the most marvelous property of light. We see, because light is! It was once suggested that light originated in the eye, and illuminated the world. It was quickly pointed out that we should be able to see even at night, if that was the case. No, the eye has the property of using light from the sun, candles, lanterns and a multitude of electrical powered lamps to produce vision, the ability to see things.
So - what is the nature of light? Light is a form of radio wave, except we “tune it in” via our eyes, rather than on a radio or television receiver. (Physicists talk about a lot of things deeper than we will go.) We see the colors of a rainbow sort of like “different channels” for red and green and blue light. Marvelous!
Light does not travel instantaneously: the speed of light in a vacuum is presently defined to be about 186,282 miles per second, which is still pretty fast. The speed of light is a factor in Einstein’s famous equation E=mc^2.
Astronomers use a form of celestial measurement called a “Light Year” to calculate the vast distances to stars and galaxies. It takes light about four years to reach earth from the closest star, about 23,462,784,000,000 miles away. How many light years to the edge of the universe? A bunch! And yet God is there. Even the best scientists and physicists struggle with things too marvelous for us to comprehend, but every speck - every force - in the universe is there because God said so.
The use of a light bulb image in cartoon or comic strips symbolizes enlightenment, indicating greater knowledge and understanding about a subject or situation. Those who simply “don’t get it,” are in the dark.
In the New Testament, John equates anyone who hates his brother with darkness. “He walks in darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.” (1 John 2:11) However, “He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling in him.” (1 John 2:10)
Jesus spoke of the salt of the earth, and the light of the world in the Beatitudes. “Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven.” (Matthew 5:16)
What is that light? “God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. (1 John 1:5) “But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us of all sin.” (1 John 1:7)
Let the glory of God illuminate your life. Don’t hide your light under a bushel (No!) as children sometimes sing. But walk as children of light.
Let Your Light Shine

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Scripture: Isaiah said, “O people of Jacob, come, let us walk in the light of the Lord.” Isaiah 2:5, NEB

Silently, one by one, in the infinite meadows of heaven,
Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of the angels.
Evangeline; Longfellow.

We are by nature creatures of light. Total darkness leaves us disoriented. Sighted persons crave light, and avoid darkness whenever possible. Even the shorter periods of daylight during fall and winter months leave many of us SAD (Seasonal Affective Disorder.) SAD makes us sad; “affected with or expressive of grief or unhappiness, : DOWNCAST”, according to my dictionary.
Lack of light is not the only thing that may make us sad, however. Life is full of frustrations, pain, sorrows, and unfulfilled ambitions. We desire none of those things, of course. Our hope is to be bright and cheery, not gloomy, dreary, or dull.
We counsel the downcast that into each life some rain must fall, that the night is darkest before the dawn, to look for the LIGHT at the end of the tunnel. Easy to say, until it’s your umbrella that leaks, your candle that goes out, or your tunnel that ends in a blank wall.
Climbing out of the pit of despair is not easy, but it can be done. The Book of Psalms bears evidence of this. If all you ever do is add grief to sorrow to despair (all minuses), what do you get? An endless circle of misery! Negatives!
What did the psalmists do? They added a BIG plus into the equation -they added God! They added light; they moved from downcast to upcast.
Psalmists of old proclaimed the handiwork of God, as evidenced in the stars of heaven. And, yes, the stars are brightest when the night is the darkest.
We are now in the Advent season. When times were indeed dark for humanity, God sent a great light into the world. John 1:5, affirms that the light shines on in the dark, and the darkness has never mastered it. The very stars of heaven announced His coming. The heavens were filled with light, and the splendor of the Lord shone round about the shepherds. Luke 2:9
We become what we dwell upon in our thoughts, words, and deeds. In cooking, they immerse meat in a flavoring sauce, called a merinade. Well, you can marinade your life with nastiness and sorrow, or you can look to light, joy, and the many blessings God gives us. Immerse yourself in looking for God’s gifts; shove the darkness behind the Son of God. Pick some forget-me-nots of the angels.
December 1, 2002