Advent24

Matthew 18;16 but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to stumble, it would be better for him that a huge millstone should be hung around his neck, and that he should be sunk in the depths of the sea. (Also see Mark 9;2) If you stop to think about this, its a pretty gruesome thing for Jesus to say.  It would be better to be drowned than to endure the wrath of God which will be unleashed on those who cause a believer (specifically a child) to fall/sin/backslide/abandon faith.   We've recently, sadly, had yet another child abuse scandal come to light in the church.  For decades a so-called minister was sexually and violently abusing ' little ones' in his care, apparently with the full knowledge of many in authority over him.  Without a doubt that man will have caused many of his victims to walk away from faith, mistrust Jesus, despise God.  And really, who could blame them?  Jesus is perfectly clear that there is something worse than...

 Matthew 21;44   And  the one who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; and  when it falls on anyone, it will crush him.” Jesus in this verse is talking to the religious leaders of the day and castigating them for not recognising Him.  He has spoken really harshly to them in parables which demonstrate God's anger at their arrogance and unbelief. He has said that the inheritance which has been so far reserved for the Jews is now going to be thrown open to the Gentiles because they have believed despite having none of the privilege of Torah education.   This is not gentle Jesus meek and mild.  This is furious Jesus confronting those who should have been leading people into the presence of God but who have been obstructing and condemning and self serving.  It is clear from reading this whole passage in Matthew that Jesus sees right through the whited sepulchres of these guys hearts.  He knows they are plotting against Him. Here...

  1 Peter 2:5   You yourselves like living stones are being built up as a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. I like this verse. Its a simple visual aid to help us see God's plan and where we fit into it.  We are bricks in a wall.  All of us are the same, none more important than the next. We fit together perfectly.  We are being built into the wall by a master builder who knows exactly what He is doing.  We are built on solid foundations - Jesus our cornerstone and the spiritual practises of the prophetic and the apostolic.  We are all touching at least six other bricks which are cemented in around us. Together we are an edifice in which the presence of God can reside. Our job is to minister to God through Jesus by offering our prayers, worship and service to Him. 9  But you are a chosen people,  a royal priesthood,  a holy nation,  God’s special possession...

Ezekiel 36:26-27 New King James Version (NKJV) I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. I will put My Spirit within you and cause you to walk in My statutes, and you will keep My judgments and do them. I've got a really poor memory and always have had. Theres not much that I can recall from my childhood unless Ive got the prompt of a diary post or a photograph.  But one thing I do remember is reading these verses in Ezekiel for the first time not long after Id become a Christian at the age of 16.  I remember being deeply moved and rather excited that these words. spoken to a prophet generations before I existed, had come to fulfilment in my own life.  As a baby Christian I was aware that God had given me a heart transplant. I knew I was new.  I was amazed and thankful. This promise is pretty awesome when you look at it carefully.  We are promised both a new heart ...

  Do not move your neighbour’s boundary  stone  set up by your predecessors in the inheritance you receive in the land the  Lord  your God is giving you to possess.  Deut 19;14 Cursed is anyone who moves their neighbour’s  boundary   stone .” Deut 27:17 The  Lord  tears down the house of the proud, but he sets the widow’s  boundary   stone s in place. Proverbs 15;25 Do not move an ancient  boundary   stone  or encroach on the fields of the fatherless, Prov 23;10 Judah’s leaders are like those who move  boundary   stone s. I will pour out my wrath on them like a flood of water.  Hosea 5;10 It would seem that boundaries are important to God.  Its easy to spiritualise and make these scriptures into a lesson on morality. But these old testament scriptures are actually about land and the high value God places on everyone having their own place to live, especially the orphans and the widows.  H...

 So this is the most important stone in the Bible. The one that was rolled away on resurrection morning by an angel who sat on top of it waiting for the women to arrive so they could share the monumental message that Jesus had risen from the dead (Matt 28;1-8) Here's something I hadn't considered before.  The stone wasn't rolled away to let Jesus out.  We know that the risen Jesus could walk through walls.  He could have chosen to 'disappear' from the tomb and 'reappear' in the upper room in front of the disciples.  But He didn't choose to walk through walls till a bit later.  Why?  I mean, it might have been even more impressive to have appeared alive to the disciples and then Roman guards roll away the still sealed stone to find nobody in the tomb.   Thats probably how I would have played it.  Jesus chose something different.  And He always does everything for a reason. So, first off, the stone was moved by angels, not by Jesus ex...

    But Lot’s wife looked back,  and she became a pillar of salt. Gen 19: 26   OK, so a pillar of salt isnt technically a stone, but for the purposes of this blog it is. When I was in the midst of depression a few years back I found myself unable to live in the present and do today well.  I was constantly either looking back to my past and berating myself for the decisions I'd made - second guessing the outcomes that different choices might have effected- or I was looking forward to an impossible-to-guess future and stressing about what it might look like and how I would cope with it.  It was a miserable place to be. I only really started to see it for what it was when I started taking medication which straightened me out.  I gradually came back to 'today' in my head.    Lot's wife is usually condemned for her sin in harking back to what she had been told to leave.  For not trusting God and disobeying His express command not to watc...

  Revelation 2:17 Whoever has ears, let them hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who is victorious, I will give some of the hidden manna. I will also give that person a  white   stone  with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it. Im running low on energy and inspiration at the moment - mad busy with Christmas stuff for church and suddenly finding myself looking at a blank page with not alot to say.  Chris reminded me of this verse earlier in the week.  And I must say when I read it I knew I didnt really understand it.  I mean, it all seems very nice that Jesus has presents for the overcomers But why manna and why a stone? These words are spoken to the church in Pergamum.  One of the first places to have a christian congregation it was situated pretty much in the middle of the Roman empire and was a city full of pagan temples. It was the first place to have a temple dedicated to Caesar.  There was ido...

  1 Samuel 17:40 says, "He took his staff in his hand, chose five smooth stones from the stream, and put them in the pouch of his shepherd's bag What do David's five smooth stones represent?  I think they represent years of skills training,  practice with a slingshot, experience of defending the flock from wolf and lion. They represent David's confidence in his own ability with the tools of his trade to take down his enemy.  David knew which stones to pick and how many.  He didn't choose 5 in case the first four missed. He knew how good he was. And he knew God was in this battle with him, every bit as much as God had been with him when defending his flock.   Maybe he chose 5 because he always had five stones ready to go. Maybe he wanted to be ready in case other warriors stepped up after Goliath fell. Maybe he was a bit like a tennis player with tennis balls, picking up a few then discarding them one by one until the right one is in hand. David was nev...

John Chapter 8    When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone   at her.”  (v7) “Very truly I tell you,”  Jesus answered,  “before Abraham was born, I am!”     At this, they picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself, slipping away from the temple grounds. (v58) There are so many places in the Bible where people are stoned to death.  Its a brutal thing to think about. Even more disturbing is the thought that there are places in the world today where stoning is a 'legitimate' punishment.  https://theweek.com/news/crime/957354/the-countries-where-men-women-can-be-stoned-to-death   Notable that most of those condemned to be stoned are women😢 I recently heard a sermon about the woman caught in adultery in John 8.  The preacher pointed out a paralell I hadnt considered before.  Which takes us back to the sto...

 Yesterday was all about Jesus being the cornerstone. And today we come to Peter being the rock on which Jesus builds the church. How can both be true at the same time? Surely we aren't supposed to build anything on a mere human being?  It makes sense that Jesus is the foundation, the founder, the 'holder together' of the new covenant body of Christ on the earth.  So where and why does Peter come in?  I can't say I've ever really considered this before. So it's probably about time I did. Context is everything.  In Matthew 16 Jesus has taken His disciples to a place known for its shrines and monuments and temples to other gods. He asks them who people say He is. They answer : someone special. Definitely someone sent by God. But Peter has the guts to make the outrageous (for a Jew) and in some ways offensive assertion that Jesus is the Messiah.  It's a revelation which has come to him and a confession which has come out of him. Which makes Peter the first Chr...

So this is what the Sovereign Lord says: “See, I lay a stone in Zion, a tested stone, a precious cornerstone for a sure foundation; the one who relies on it will never be stricken with panic. Isaiah 28:16 As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him— 5 you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house to be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. (1 Peter 2 :4-5) The Jewish people understood their relationship with God to be inextricably tied into the presence of the temple in Jerusalem. From the very beginning God's presence had lived in an ark, or a tent, or a temple. And His covenant with His people was dependent on them keeping lots of laws and making sacrifices mediated by the priests of the temple. The physical building in Jerusalem was the most important place on earth for the Jews of Jesus's day - and still is to the Jews today. It's difficu...

 There are two significant places in the Bible where precious and semi-precious stones are mentioned.   Aaron's breastplate and the new Jerusalem.   Strangely ( or not)  just as I was starting to ponder the whole 'stones' thing this little clip popped up on my Facebook timeline.  Its of David Pawson talking about research into the properties of the new Jerusalem stones.   Jasper, Sapphire, Chalcedony, Emerald, Sardonyx, Sardius, Chrysolite, Beryl, Topaz, Chrysoprasus, Jacinth, and Amethyst .  Please take a couple of minutes to watch. You will marvel and smile at the creativity and cleverness of God https://www.facebook.com/share/v/17s1xbyRk9/

 Luke 19 : 40   “I tell you,”  He replied,  “if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.” I love this verse.  I know its not a verse primarily about stones.  And yet it is about stones . It tells me that there is a whole other layer of stuff going on in our world about which we are largely unaware.  The Bible is full of references to nature having a 'voice'.  The trees of the field will clap their hands.  The stars sing. The stones cry out.  It all sounds like poetic metaphor, but actually, the more science evolves the more we are discovering that indeed all things do make sounds.  Stars really do sing. Google it. Its fascinating. When Jesus spoke these words nobody knew whales communiate across oceans and dolphins talk to each other in clicks. Humans can only  hear a limited range of sounds : those with frequencies between about 20 hertz (low sounds like thunder) and 20 kilohertz (very high sounds like some species of bats)....

  And the tempter came and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”  Matt 4:3 Ive been thinking alot about the 'temptation in the wilderness' story recently.  And Im seeing lots of things in it that I havent seen before.  And as we are looking at stones, I turned my attention to the stones Jesus was stepping over and sitting on during His 40 days and what Satan had to say about them. The traditional interpretation of these verses often focuses on the fact that Jesus was fasting and therefore hungry. So the temptation to turn stones into bread was all about Him satisfying His natural desires by using His creative powers etc etc.  BUT..... as someone who has fasted for reasonably lengthy periods in the past I can report that once you are past about day 3 you dont really feel hungry much.  And past day 5 or 6 hunger pangs disappear completely.  Ive never lasted 40 days so I cant say for certain what happens at that...

The Lord said to Moses, 8 “Take the staff, and you and your brother Aaron gather the assembly together. Speak to that rock before their eyes and it will pour out its water. You will bring water out of the rock for the community so they and their livestock can drink.” 9 So Moses took the staff from the Lord’s presence, just as he commanded him. 10 He and Aaron gathered the assembly together in front of the rock and Moses said to them, “Listen, you rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock?” 11 Then Moses raised his arm and struck the rock twice with his staff. Water gushed out, and the community and their livestock drank. 12 But the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, “Because you did not trust in me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them.” (Numbers 20) Seems a bit harsh doesnt it? Moses forfeits his right to enter the promised land just because he struck the rock rather than spoke to it. Lots of words ...