Your Set Time

Good morning to all on this glorious Sunday morning. Waine and I had a wonderful week in Jamaica and had a time to catch up with old friends. We left 6 degree weather in Atlanta and landed into a paradise of 75 degrees! Our friends were complaining that winter had come to Jamaica and Waine and I were praising God for the beautiful balmy weather. Perspective is such a hard task master--when mastered though we are free to be the people that God intended. Continue to pray for ET and his family. He will be getting a CT scan on the 31st of December and then on to surgery when the margins are found to be clean. Also pray concerning your own Set Time--that time when God will reveal the answers to your prayers. Each of us have our own set times--we just have to be open to them. I heard a story this morning during devotion about a young man who wanted to swim the English channel. He believed he could do it and therefore set out to do what no other person had done up to that point. Although the channel was filled with sharks and jelly fish, he believed he could do it. So he started off and swam 1 hour, then 3 hours, then 5 hours and although his arms were tired and he was cold he still kept swimming. At the 8th hour a dense fog set in but he kept on swimming. He could no longer see the other shore, but he kept swimming. At the 12th hour he was exhausted physically and mentally and was no longer able to hold on to the vision of the other shore. He gave up and got into the row boat that was following him. They began to roll toward what they thought was the direction of the shore and to his and everyone elses amazement, he was only 50 feet from the shore when he gave up. He gave up just as his victory was in hand. Ignore your "fog" today and focus on the inner vision that God has given you about your Set Time. Believe it and receive it. Your victory is at hand! Amen and amen.

I am continuing my journey in Romans, chapter 9 verses 1 - 5, Paul is writing to the Jewish Christians in Rome, "I speak the truth in Christ—I am not lying, my conscience confirms it through the Holy Spirit. I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.  For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my people, those of my own race,  the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption to sonship; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises. Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of the Messiah, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.

Paul continued to have an anguish because the Jews he was preaching to about Christ, the Messiah, would not accept the fact that God came in the form of Man, the Christ, so that all mankind could be saved. The Roman Jews were continuing their search for the "Messiah" even though Christ fulfilled the lineage as foretold in the old testament. They continued to be in their "fog" and this hurt Paul to his very soul. Jewish children are taught the lineage of Christ from the time they are able to comprehend and yet when Jesus came, He was not accept by His own people although His birth fulfilled the lineage as foretold in the old Testament. That's how Sin works. Sin will blind you into thinking that your own reasoning is better than that of the Great Divine God. That was Satan's folly; he thought himself better than his Maker, God, and was cut off from the source of his power and inspiration. Satan prowls this earth seeking others to join his misery. Do not be fooled. Be like Paul and listen to your conscience which is confirmed by the Holy Spirit. Remain victorious in your hope which is in Christ. Speak the name of Jesus and receive His Power. Do not be fooled by the evil one that you will remain in the "fog"; instead continue to press on to your Set Time which is the plan of God for your life. Hallelujah and amen!

Stephanie