Showing posts with label Exodus. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Exodus. Show all posts

Thursday, October 23, 2014

The Beatitudes: Blessed Are The Merciful



Matthew 5:7 KJV
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.

Exodus 21:22-25 KJV
22 If men strive, and hurt a woman with child, so that her fruit depart from her, and yet no mischief follow: he shall be surely punished, according as the woman's husband will lay upon him; and he shall pay as the judges determine.
23 And if any mischief follow, then thou shalt give life for life,
24 Eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot,
25 Burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.

Genesis 50:20-21 KJV
20 But as for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive.
21 Now therefore fear ye not: I will nourish you, and your little ones. And he comforted them, and spake kindly unto them.

I have been tossing this post around for nearly a week. I have been putting off writing it because it was a difficult one to research. I think that anyone that knows me, know the heart that I have for babies and for children. To think of one suffering in any magnitude, breaks my heart. I rarely watch the news for this very reason, my nerves simply can't handle it. 

Yet if anyone deserves our mercy it is our children. Both born and unborn.

And so it is with a broken heart that I find myself writing this tonight. That it even needs to be written speaks to the evil that the world has succumbed to. 

I cannot tell you of the pain of rape or incest. I have never suffered such tragedies in my life. I cannot tell you of the pain of being rejected by the only family I have because of what is deemed a mistake in their eyes. I cannot tell you of the pain of being told that I am an inconvenience and I need to be gotten rid of. Or that I am deformed and therefore not worth letting live. Yet, since the legalization of abortion in 1973, millions of babies have suffered this pain, have been murdered simply because they were unwanted. 

I sit here with a lump in my throat, trying to banish the images from my mind that I have seen tonight. But I realize that it's this very mindset that let the horrors of Kermit Gosnell's abortion clinic go on for over 3 decades. Sticking my head in the sand will not unsee what I have seen and it certainly won't stop what is being done in our country. 

There are viable babies being born all over our country tonight that are being refused medical care or being flat out murdered because they are complications of abortion. As if it isn't heinous enough that we legally snuff out the lives of babies because they are "non-persons" until they are born and fill their lungs with oxygen, it is pure evil that allows a baby to die alone in a metal dish, refusing life saving medical treatment, simply because he was supposed to have died during the abortion procedure. It is the stuff of nightmares. Truly it is. I had no idea, or perhaps I just didn't want to believe that man could be so cold and callous, that there are babies who survive abortions, babies who, with medical intervention, could live a healthy life. But men like Kermit Gosnell, who perform illegal abortions on women well into their 3rd trimesters and routinely deliver viable babies, are "ensuring fetal demise" without blinking an eye. I read for myself tonight parts of the Pennsylvania Grand Jury Report in Gosnell's trial and I could do nothing but sit and weep in anger, in horror, in utter sadness. I was completely unprepared for the photos that were included. Seeing the gruesome effects of his "medical practice" and knowing that for over 30 years his employees not only stood by but helped him, never questioning his obvious illegal practices, was in itself sickening. 

We have convinced ourselves that if it doesn't affect us, it's not our problem. Not my monkeys, not my circus. Maybe so, but when the monkeys show up on your doorstep, overturning your right to vote against homosexual marriage, your right to carry a gun, your right to free speech, then I guess the circus tent just got a whole lot bigger.

Women like Kay Hagan, Wendy Davis, Gloria Steinem, who support abortion, even abortion after 20 weeks, are terrifying to me. These are women brainwashing other women into believing that babies are an invasion on their bodies, inconveniences causing them to lose control of their lives. 

And let's get one thing clear, whether or not a baby at 12 weeks can feel pain or whether it can't until 20 weeks, is utterly irrelevant. Abortion is murder. Life begins at conception. 

The Bible tells us in Exodus, that if a man harms a pregnant woman and causes her fruit to depart from her, to deliver prematurely, and the baby lives then the man must pay whatever the judge determines. But if she delivers prematurely and the baby is harmed or dies, life for life is required. Can you imagine if every mother, father, friend, abortionist, nurse, or anyone else that might be involved in a woman's decision and subsequent abortion, had their life required for the baby's life they stole?

We need to stand up and speak out against abortion, in all stages of gestation. We need to speak up and put an end to an evil that man has deemed acceptable and legal. We must show these babies mercy. Because they are at the mercy of our morals, our laws, our convictions.  And regardless of how they were conceived, whether you deem it to be the right time in your life, or whether that baby is healthy or not, what man thinks as evil against us, God means for good.

I can think of another group of people deemed unwanted, unfit, and undesirable. Sinners. You and me. All it took was One Man willing to show us mercy to save us from a neverending, unceasing hellfire and damnation. Christ Jesus. He laid down His life and became our Interceder. He died so that we could have eternal life by simply believing on Him.

Let us intercede, let us show mercy to the innocent, the unborn. 

Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy.

Saturday, June 14, 2014

Who Are You Lord? : I Am Strength, I Am Power



Exodus 14:14 KJV
The Lord shall fight for you, and ye shall hold your peace.

2 Samuel 22:33 KJV
God is my strength and power: and he maketh my way perfect.

Psalms 68:35 KJV
O God, thou art terrible out of thy holy places: the God of Israel is he that giveth strength and power unto his people. Blessed be God.

Psalms 73:26 KJV
My flesh and my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.


When I Lay My Isaac Down

Abraham prayed for the day 
God would give him a son 
Blessed Isaac was his name 
The greatest gift he’d ever known 
Then came the day, who would have dreamed 
God would say “You gotta give him back to me
And on this mountain you will prove, 
That it’s you and Isaac, or it’s me and you”

So when I lay my Isaac down 
With a broken heart but my Fathers proud 
And on this altar where he lays 
Just to find it wasn’t him, God wanted me

Now most of us I’d dare to say 
We've got an Isaac standing in God’s way 
But it's on this altar you too can prove 
That it’s not your Isaac that God wants 
But He wants you

And when I lay my Isaac down 
With a broken heart but my Fathers proud 
And on this altar where he lays 
Just to find it wasn’t him, God wanted me

And when I lay my Isaac down 
With a broken heart but my Fathers proud 
And on this altar where he lays 
Just to find it wasn’t him, God wanted me

And on this altar where he lays 
Just to find it wasn’t him, God wanted me

All to Jesus I surrender; 
All to Him I freely give; 
I will ever love and trust him, 
In His presence daily live. 
I surrender all, 
I surrender all, 
All to thee, my blessed Savior, 
I surrender all. 


And when I lay my Isaac down 
With a broken heart but my Fathers proud 
And on this altar where he lays 
Just to find it wasn’t him, God wanted me

And on this altar where he lays 
Just to find it wasn’t him, God wanted me

I cannot imagine being Abraham or how he felt when God called on him to offer Isaac as a sacrifice.  The Bible says nothing about Abraham's emotions, only of his obedience.  God called and he answered, "here am I". God gave him instructions and he immediately began to pack for the journey to the mountains of Moriah.  No questions. No arguments. Just obedience. Just faith. Just strength and power from God to do what He'd asked of him.  Exodus tells us that God will fight for us, we must only hold our peace, be still, keep quiet, and let God work.  Abraham did not have the faintest idea of what God was doing when He told him to offer his only son as a burnt offering but he held his peace because he knew God was fighting for him.  And when Isaac questioned him about the missing sacrificial lamb on the way up the mountain, he simply said that God would provide.  God gives His strength and His power to His people, and Abraham surely needed it in that moment.  It took that God-given strength and power not to jerk Isaac up against him and run like mad down the mountain toward home.  That is almost assuredly what Sarah would've done had she been in Abraham's place.  It's what I'd have done, if I'd ever finished arguing with God about going in the first place.  But Abraham didn't.  They traveled on until they reached the top and then they built the alter.  Abraham bound Isaac...and Isaac let him...more obedience, more faith, more strength, more power.  Isaac could've run, he could've fought, he could've done everything in his will to try to escape his father when he realized that he was to be the sacrifice.  But he didn't. He willingly let Abraham bind him and lay him on that alter.  And as he laid there he watched Abraham raise the knife above his head.  My flesh and heart would've failed in that moment, but not Abraham's.  God's strength and power made Abraham's way perfect and just before he brought the knife down, the angel of the Lord called out to him, stopping him.  The Bible doesn't tell of it, but I can just see Abraham's knees sagging with relief, I can see him cutting the binding on Isaac's body and hugging him tight, I can see him crying out to God with thanks for sparing his son and sending the ram.

Three times was Abraham called upon in Genesis 22, by God, by Isaac, by the angel.  And each time he answered, "here am I."  How do we answer when God calls upon us? Do we answer with obedience and faith? Do we answer with strength and power? Or do we answer in fear?  I am guilty of answering in fear more often than not, that is if I'm not trying to hide from Him completely. But God may be calling on me to see if I'll lay my Isaac down, if I'm willing to surrender all to Him.  Because if I'm not, if I've got an Isaac standing in my way, then I can never reach God's full potential for me. I'll never be given the full strength and power meant for me without my faith and obedience.