September 29, 2015

Preparation

Two churches with similar sounding names, Mesa View and Sunny View, happen to be located in a rural area within a few miles of each other — and on the same highway. For a church visit I arrived at the right time, but the wrong church. I waited in the foyer for what I thought was the end of an adult Sunday school class, but I later learned it was the tail end of the worship service. Reminiscent of the five foolish virgins who failed to take extra oil for their lamps, my preparation for the service was lacking. Jesus cautioned, “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know the day or the hour” (Matt 25:13 NIV).

1 comment:

Steve Corey said...

Gail;

-----He did say, “…the day or the hour…” didn’t He? I mean, if He said we would not know the day or the hour, then knowing the year, month, maybe even the week?
-----”Oh, yah, Steve, but you got to take it more symbolically. He didn’t mean it so literally. But symbolically, it simply means you can’ know when that time is.”
-----How dumb a rooster must I be in this barnyard!? If Jesus didn’t mean we could see the time coming as it neared, then why on this earth did He tell us to keep watch? What was the oil for the lamps all about? And for what were we supposed to watch?
-----My mind takes me to the closing chapter of Daniel. “[The angel] said, ‘Go your way, Daniel, for the words are shut up and sealed until the time of the end.’” (Dan 12:9) Being a good author, you also know that “until” speaks another sentence in one word, saying that “the words” will be unsealed and opened up in the time of the end. What relevance or reference would that concept of being “open at the end” have if “being at the end” was not also discernable? And what would make “the end” discernable? Maybe I’m just a dumb rooster, but it seems to me that things would be looking a whole lot like what the Bible says about the end.
-----”Oh, yah, but, but, Steve, they’ve been saying for thousands of years things look like the end. Gee! Everyone thought AD1000 would be Christ‘s return!”
-----There’s those elusive “theys” again! And gee, don’t they stretch around everyone like a gnat’s lips around a barrel? Yes, many thought AD1000 was the end. There just wasn‘t much evidence of an end then. Maybe they just felt that way. And although they had nearly as many clues evidencing the identity of the Beast’s seventh head as we have, they did not have Israel in the promised land as a nation -a giant, beacon of a clue, a detail of scripture occupying only the final, winding-up years of evil’s disgusting “reign” on earth (I assure you by the very signs only God Himself could possibly have set in place like tiny cherries atop the vast mountain of scripture proclaiming God as always in control, reigning over this earth; though evil seems on the loose, it has always been trapped in the very death hole where it will soon end.) I have a friend who thinks we will be raptured before the end of this year. I disagree with “will be“, but I agree completely with “might be”, because I’m watching too, and I see what he sees.
-----As the end draws near, the signs are getting more clear. Either that or my friend and I are just getting rooster dumber. How coincidental must coincidences become? Total lunar eclipse of a supermoon on Tabernacles, the Jewish holiday celebrating the Messiah’s dwelling on earth with His people? Two weeks after a partial solar eclipse on Rosh-ash-Hannah, yadda, yadda, yadda about tetrads and Jerusalem and 1948 and the discovery of America made to become Israel’s major support now quickly realigning with Israel’s enemies (II Thes 2:7 anyone?) just as this set of total lunar eclipses closes out? What? And there’s no telling, is there? Just wait until the rest of what there is to know about signs in the heavens is told forth! I can’t wait to hear the barking, “Nobody knows the day and the hour! Nobody knows the day and the hour! Nobody knows the day and the hour!” Maybe somebody should have put enough oil in their lamp to know there most certainly is a whole lot more available information than just “Nobody knows the day and the hour!”
-----This evil mess is very close to being over, my beloved friends, and I am pumped! Bring it on, Lord Jesus! Make our day.

Love you all,
Steve Corey