Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. Ephesians 4:29.
Taste and see that the LORD is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him. Psalm 34:8.
“When it pleased God . . . to reveal His Son in me . . .” Galatians 1:15-16.
And continuing our 351 Old Testament prophecies, promises of God, fulfilled in Jesus Christ, we come to number 164: He shall teach all nations. Isaiah 2:3: And many peoples will come and say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; that He may teach us concerning His ways and that we may walk in His paths.” For the law will go forth from Zion and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. And, John 4:25: The woman said to Him, “I know that Messiah is coming (He who is called Christ); when that One comes, He will declare all things to us.”
I loved this in My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chambers: “The New Testament teaching about regeneration is that when a person is hit by his own sense of need, God will put the Holy Spirit into his spirit, and his personal spirit will be energized by the Spirit of the Son of God – “until Christ is formed in you” (Galatians 4:19). The moral miracle of redemption is that God can put a new nature into me through which I can live a totally new life. When I finally reach the edge of my need and know my own limitations, then Jesus says, “Blessed are you” (Matthew 5:11). But I must get to that point. God cannot put into me, the responsible moral person that I am, the nature that was in Jesus Christ unless I am aware of my need for it. Just as the nature of sin entered into the human race through one man, the Holy Spirit entered into the human race through another Man (see Romans 5:12-19). And redemption means that I can be delivered from the heredity of sin, and that through Jesus Christ I can receive a pure and spotless heredity, namely, the Holy Spirit.”
There is such a relief as we listen to Creator God – Father, Son, Spirit. He created all that is including us. As Creator He knows all that is needed. We don’t know and that is why we flounder about doing the same things and thinking the same troubling thoughts and wonder why everything is so messed up. Oh, but as we turn to Him, He begins a help so needed in us. And the first thing to go is the lie we have believed about Him. And as we begin to let Him teach us, we find love and hope and truth. The Light so needed to see all that is real.
***A SYRIAN PRAYER – O God, who is the unsearchable abyss of peace, the ineffable sea of love, the fountain of blessings, and the bestower of affection, who sends peace to those that receive it, open to us this day the sea of Your love and water us with the plenteous streams from the riches of Your grace. Make us children of quietness and heirs of peace. Kindle in us the fire of Your love. Sow in us Your fear. Strengthen our weakness by Your power. Bind us closely to You and each other in one firm bond of unity for the sake of Jesus Christ. Amen. Syrian Clementine Liturgy, first century.***
