Tag: jeremiah

  • A Heart Cries Out

    A Heart Cries Out

    A heart cries out

    In sad futility:

    Is anyone out there?

    Does anyone care?

     

    Yes, says the Lord

    I hear your prayer.

    Do you hear my answer?

    Do you really care?

     

    A soul sadly survives

    Without being alive:

    Why do I matter?

    Why do my thoughts scatter?

     

    I still love your soul.

    I showed you the Way.

    When will you believe,

    That your heart will not deceive?

     

    Is anyone out there?

    Does anyone care?

     

    I hear you in prayer.

    I AM your joy and salvation.

     

    Sad, isn’t it – the futility of one without God.

    In fact, the Bible points to many of God’s faithful who have moments of doubt and hopelessness.  Yet their answer always comes though faith and prayer.

    The American Heritage Dictionary gives us a rather complete picture of futility by definition:

    1. The quality of having no useful result; uselessness.
    2. Lack of importance or purpose; frivolousness.
    3. A futile act.
    “Life without God is lifelessness.
    We often confuse the emotions and moods of the heart with the temporal worldly meanings imposed on our self-seeking souls by the ruler of this world.
    • The world does not equate Heart to soul.
    • Love is only equated to sexual love by the imposition of false meaning twisting our every thought.

    We do not think to ask God for an answer.  Time after time our heart cries out in hopelessness.

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    Without God as part of the love of our life, we miss out on the very love God intended.
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    The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? – Jeremiah 17:9 KJV
    If you want to understand the heart, look to the Hebrew root word: leb.
    Foremost in your understanding of your own heart is that your heart is your soul. 

    We are not really just the flesh and bones that others see or the mind and actions you show off to others. At the core of our being, you are your Leb:

    inner man, mind, will, heart, understanding; 

    1. Inner part, midst
    2. midst (of things)
    3. heart (of man)
    4. soul, heart (of man)
    5. mind, knowledge, thinking, reflection, memory
    6. inclination, resolution, determination (of will)
    7. conscience
    8. heart (of moral character)
    9. as seat of appetites
    10. as seat of emotions and passions
    11. as seat of courage

    Yes, there is much more to us than just our nature of the flesh.

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    The scriptures about the heart are also most revealing.  The list is long and includes some of what Jesus had to say about our hearts.

    Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, ‘Out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.’ – John 7:38 ESV

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    So why are faith and prayer the answer?

    Did you hear a conversation in the opening poem?

    One caught-up in his or her own heart will have neither humility nor faith to hear God’s answer:

    requiring trust in Jesus as Lord.

     Psalm 4:

    Answer me when I call, O God of my righteousness!
    You have given me relief when I was in distress.
    Be gracious to me and hear my prayer!

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    Jesus Christ, who sacrificed Himself on the Cross because of God’s love for you said:

    And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith. – Matthew 21:22 ESV

    Does your heart cry out?

    You with ears to hear, listen to God in your conversation of prayer.

    Jesus IS Lord.

  • Liar, liar, pants on fire

    Liar, liar, pants on fire

    Do you recall that kid’s expression?

    I heard it from my friends when caught in a lie.

    Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire

    It’s not a biblical quote, however the Bible continually teaches us the value of truth and the consequence of lies.  God takes truth very seriously.

    “The Liar.” a poem by William Blake from about 200 years ago is probably the source of the expression. Jesus had to deal with liars even in the Temple 2000 years ago. (We’ll get to that shortly.) And about 3000 years ago the Proverbs of the Bible addressed lies as wickedness in relationships.

    Proverbs 17:4 An evildoer listens to wicked lips,

    and a liar gives ear to a mischievous tongue.

    Wickedness, mischief, speaking evil – all connected.

    We owe our souls to the master of lies when we are unwilling to face the truth of God.  We tell lies first to our SELF – lies from Satan. Then we lie to others to cover our evil tracks.

    Lies poison our relationships with others.  Liars willingly listen to other liars, accepting lies as truth.

    Why would a ‘friend,’ a family member or a loved one lie for you?   What truth visible to God would they hide?

    Consider the evil motives of a liar:

    “If someone is willing to lie for you, they are also willing to lie to you.

    Men with miserable lives will even die for a lie they willingly believe — (reward of evil: virgins for them in heaven). These same religious leaders who cover women from head to toe on earth will lead their fellow sinners to death for the lie of a false prophet.

    Religious leaders lead followers toward worship of a virgin while claiming chastity to God and hiding unrighteousness with a lie for a friend. Church Bishops have even built homes for mistresses and lovers even in medieval times.

    Wickedness, built on lies – even to the highest levels of religious leadership at times and in all faiths over the millenia.

    Jesus had to confront this in the Pharisees of the Temple – evil and wicked men with motives to hold onto their power and evil even in face of opposing God. They brought a woman caught in adultery to Jesus to test him.  They did not bring the man to stone. (Perhaps he was a religious leader.)

    Then the Pharisees accused Jesus of being born out of a relationship of unrighteousness, in essence saying: “Your mother was no virgin.”

    Of course the lie in this is not the issue. The point is Who they confront with all of their lies to hold onto their power:

    Jesus IS Son of Man, Son of God – Jesus IS truth.

    Part of the Talmud is a lie. The Book of Mormon is a lie. The Bible of the Jehovah Witness is a lie (full of incomplete and deliberately mistranslated Scripture). And of course the writings of the false prophet of Arabia are a lie.

    The atheist is both a liar and a contradiction. How can you be ‘against’ a God you do not believe in? Yet justification of SELF and the evil without accountability require much effort and energy of the atheist, the agnostic, and worshipers of creation in place of the Creator. NO God = NO hell (the same false lie and false hope of the idolatrous religions: Hinduism, Buddhism and others).

    Again from Proverbs – the caution from the Bible:

    Proverbs 30:5-6 Every word of God proves true;
    he is a shield to those who take refuge in him.

    Do not add to his words,
    lest he rebuke you and you be found a liar.

    To be clear (for those who refuse to listen to God’s truth), definition  for ‘rebuke’ from the Hebrew word:

    yakach  [“He will reprove” KJV] – to prove, decide, judge, rebuke, reprove, correct, be right

    God will judge your lie.  Consider the description of Hell, liar.

    John 8:

    23 He said to them, “You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world. 24 I told you that you would die in your sins, for unless you believe that I am he you will die in your sins.”

    25 So they said to him, “Who are you?”

    Jesus said to them,“Just what I have been telling you from the beginning…

    The Truth Will Set You Free

    31 So Jesus said to the Jews who had believed him, “If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples, 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

    You Are of Your Father the Devil

    44 You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 45 But because I tell the truth, you do not believe me…

    Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire

    Are you so bold as to stand up to the liars of this world for the Truth?

    Proverbs 8:

    6 Hear, for I will speak noble things,
    and from my lips will come what is right,
    7 for my mouth will utter truth;
    wickedness is an abomination to my lips.
    8 All the words of my mouth are righteous;
    there is nothing twisted or crooked in them.
    9 They are all straight to him who understands,
    and right to those who find knowledge.

    Jeremiah 5:3

    O LORD, do not your eyes look for truth?
    You have struck them down,
    but they felt no anguish;
    you have consumed them,
    but they refused to take correction.
    They have made their faces harder than rock;
    they have refused to repent.

    John 14;

    I Am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life

    14 “Let not your hearts be troubled.

    Believe in God; believe also in me. 2 In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. 4 And you know the way to where I am going.”

    … “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?”

    6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

  • Jeremiah 31:3

    Jeremiah 31:3

    I have loved thee with an everlasting love. – Jeremiah 31:3

    Witness of Jasmeane Kumari.

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