#publictalk today is entitled: ‘What is Your Standing with God?’ The ‘great cloud’ of witnesses Heb 11 will be focus. Somewhere I recall reading that Greek word for ‘cloud’ is not those puffy clouds of a half-sunny day but a completely enveloping cloud, often used metaphorically.
‘“Who here likes camping?’ the speaker queries & several raised hands. Sure. It’s fun, he agrees. “But there is a threshold at which camping is no longer fun.” He is speaking of Abraham at Hebrews 11:8-9 …1/2
“By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed by going out to a place he was to receive as an inheritance…he lived as a foreigner in the land of the promise as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the very same promise.”…2/2
Another anecdote the speaker lays on us from his high school days when apparently he was a hot shot athletes. Gym pupils told to line up to race, first place will earn an A—an easy A, he thought as he won the race. ….1/3
But it was an F! “You see these things called lanes? You’re supposed to stay in them!”…..2/3
Why do I think of my high school gym teacher, a popular crew cut guy with super deep voice who nonetheless struck terror into even the toughest kids when he was angry. “Thirty sit-ups!” he tell the class. Glancing at his belly, he’d add, “I can’t—but you’d better!”….3/3
#WatchtowerStudy today entitled: Continue to “Listen to Him” Theme verse: “This is my Son, the beloved, whom I have approved. Listen to him.”—MATT. 17:5. Such was the transfiguration voice from heaven that cut off Peter as he was talking just for the sake of talking
Focus of first half of study: “Go in through the narrow gate, because broad is the gate and spacious is the road leading off into destruction, and many are going in through it;whereas narrow is the gate and cramped the road leading off into life” with few finding it. Matt 7:13-14
Para 6: the “guardrail near the edge of a narrow mountain road [that] serves as a protection’ resonates with one sis who knows of many such passages “in West Virginia.”
The steep drop off reminds me of some Vietnamese refugees we befriended who immediately crossed ….1/2
the “DO NOT CROSS” sign at Letchworth (because they couldn’t read English” to stare down from cliff edge. They were not impressed. There were deeper drop offs in Vietnam, they told me…..2/2
Matt 5:23-24 is the 2nd focus of the study: “If, then, you are bringing your gift to the altar and there you remember that your brother has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar, and go away. …1/2
First make your peace with your brother, and then come back and offer your gift.” Be a peacemaker is the idea.
Para 11; A wonderful and heartwarming account of Jacob making peace with his brother. I apply it to making peace with my brother, even if he is a no-good Scrabble cheat (like last night)
Para 14. One bro says of the 12-step program that it includes seeking out those you are not on good terms with and making amends. I did not know this of that program. It’s not easy to do, he says “since we all have egos.”
Para 14: One bro recalls how he did become a peacemaker with one who bore him a grudge. “I had to buy him a couple of dinners, but it was worth it,” he says.
Para 16: “Remember that restoring peace with your brother is more important than establishing who was right and who was wrong..” Would have been hard on Jacob had he done that, wouldn’t it? ‘You see, Esau, the problem was that you were a lout.’ Best not go there.
Ha! The midweekmeeting chairman taking much ribbing over his new wallpaper background of ‘x’s and ‘o’s. Looks like he posts his tic tac toe games, one bro says. Looks like the curtain into the Most Holy, another says. (It doesn’t)
‘Hugs and kisses,’ probably. It’s sort of an optical illusion and looks different up close.
I really hope no one goes on and on about the 1 Samuel 6:4-5 images of the golden piles tonight. I mean, how crass.
Yeah, He ridicules and insults the false gods, one bro says, and those who put trust in them. They are compelled to make images of their piles. Oh my.
Is this the verse that accounts for Indiana Jones knowing enough not to look upon the Ark of the Covenant where is his impious foes did not and got their heads mashed? “But God struck down the men of Beth-sheʹmesh, because they had looked upon the Ark of Jehovah.” 1 Samuel 6:19
One sis recalls the childhood game ‘Hot Potato’ as she comments on the verses of passing along the Ark to others.
Yikes! Searching for the right word and he can’t find it. I’ve been there. Chairman is ‘aghast —in a good way’ at the quality of a bro’s reading. Isn’t aghast by definition ‘a bad way?’
My wife has a talk coming up. As it will mean turning the laptop away from me, she checks behind her to see the house in uncluttered back there. Don’t sweat it, dear. Nothing but Better Homes and Garden here.
The chairman makes a really good point that in assembling material for a talk, you gather far more than you will use. It gives you both confidence and depth. Newbie speakers sometimes don’t know this.
Garrison Keillor used to tell of Pastor Inqvist, trying to spice up his sermons by taking tips from the TV preachers. Alas, he began pausing in such odd…………………….places that no one could follow him.
That mountain in the Pure Worship book is high—far higher & more prominent than in any actual scene, with river flowing from within, and reinforces the point that instruction, reinforcement, blessing, whatever will be from God.
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