I praise the Lord God as the source of rest for the weary! We are commanded: "Rest in the LORD, and wait patiently for him" (Psalm 37:7). The destination of the obedient believer is to enter into His rest (Psalm 95:11). The blessed Saviour Jesus Christ tells us to take His yoke on us and learn of Him in order to find rest for our souls (Matthew 11:28-29). This rest is offered not only to the Jewish nation, but also to the Gentiles; and we will all find that "his rest shall be glorious" (Isaiah 11:10). When we trust in the Lord, we enter into that rest for our souls by ceasing to seek entrance into heaven by our own works (Hebrews 4:10). But, there "remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God" (Hebrews 4:9). One day, we will enter into that glorious rest. I can rest in my Lord. He gives rest to my soul and will bring me one day into His glorious, heavenly rest. What a Lord and Saviour we have!
Isaiah 14:23 states, "I will also make it a possession for the bittern, and pools of water: and I will sweep it with the besom of destruction, saith the LORD of hosts." What is a besom? It is only mentioned in this one place in the Bible and it is a broom. This is clear in the context because it is used for sweeping. Would 'broom' then be a better rendering for modern English? Not at all. A brief study of the besom shows why it is used here. Originally, a besom was a bundle of rods or twigs used as an instrument of punishment. The word is used in English in this context as early as 893. Later (by 1000), it was used to refer to a tool for sweeping: a bundle of straw, heather, twigs, etc., bound to the end of a handle; that is, a broom. By the fourteenth century, it was used figuratively of any agent that cleanses, purifies, or sweeps away unwanted things. All three of these meanings come together in the besom of Isaiah 14:23. No other English word (including 'broom') could say it better. [historical information from Oxford English Dictionary]
The gap between Genesis 1:1 and 1:2 that is believed by myself and others for scriptural reasons is being erroneously labeled a grave heresy by some. One of the claims against such a belief is the purported foolishness of placing a gap of interminable length between two verses without any statement that there is this gap. I want to thank Walter Scott of Canada for providing several excellent examples of just this kind of gap in other scriptures. Here are some of his examples.
According to newly released statistics, the jail and prison population in America is growing at a rate of 1,000 inmates each week. The inmate population of America is presently 2.2 million, or, one out of every 136 U.S. residents. One of the fastest growing segments is among women who now make up 7% of the prison population. Does your church have a jail or prison ministry? Perhaps this would be a good time to consider starting one. Christ came for "the opening of the prison to them that are bound" (Isaiah 61:1). We thank the Lord that two men called on the Lord Jesus Christ as Saviour in our own prison ministry just last week. Please pray for these men and the workers who take the gospel to them.
According to research, bread can become moldy if it is not stored properly. Two of the big agents in the molding of bread is, exposure to air and being stored in warm, moist environments.
The Social Security Administration has released the 1,000 most popular baby names in the United States for the year 2005. Their site has some fascinating search tools for baby names that go all the way back to 1879. Names go in and out of popularity in interesting ways. In 2005, the top five boys names were Jacob, Michael, Joshua, Matthew, and Ethan. Interestingly, four of these are Bible names. In fact, 12 of the top 20 boys names come from the Bible. This does not hold for girls names. The top five for 2005 were Emily, Emma, Madison, Abigail, and Olivia. Of these, only Abigail comes from the Bible. Of the top 20 girls names, only 4 are Bible names; 5 if Grace is included.
One of the results of modern godless philosophy is to see man as nothing more than an animal or a machine. This philosophy suggests another application of a scripture which describes the power of the human reasoning: "For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he" (Proverbs 23:7). The more that modern man thinks of himself as nothing more than animal or machine, the more it will be literally true. Animal organs are being used in humans. Many humans have machine parts as well. The next step is to combine the brain with computer chips. According to a report just out: "For the first time, scientists at the Max-Planck Institute for Biochemistry in Martinsried near Munich coupled living brain tissue to a chip equivalent to the chips that run computers." This was accomplished in a rat's brain, but human brains are sure to follow. The scientists see this as "a great step forward towards neurochip prosthetics and neurocomputation." Translated, that means computer chips to keep up with your memory, to do your calculations, and eventually to correct your faulty thinking. We may wonder whose faulty thinnking they will want to correct. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.
