The House That Bears My Name!

Good day to all on this 10th day of July. Waine and I are in Hawkinsville, Georgia as usual Waine is enjoying a round of golf at the Country Club with the friends her has made here. It is very hot and humid and I just in from a vigorous walk up to main street Hawkinsville and back to the hotel--all of 2 miles! Hailie Christine has started to walk most of the time and I am sure her Mom and Dad are looking at their two toddlers and wondering where all the time has gone! It does pass quickly and before you know it your little ones are big ones with their own lives and ambitions. Oh well!

I am continuing my journey in Jeremiah 7, verses 1-20, " This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: Stand at the gate of the LORD’s house and there proclaim this message: Hear the Word of the LORD, all you people of Judah who come through these gates to worship the LORD. This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Reform your ways and your actions, and I will let you live in this place. Do not trust in deceptive words and say, “This is the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD!” If you really change your ways and your actions and deal with each other justly, if you do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow and do not shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not follow other gods to your own harm, then I will let you live in this place, in the land I gave your ancestors for ever and ever. But look, you are trusting in deceptive words that are worthless. Will you steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury, burn incense to Baal and follow other gods you have not known, and then come and stand before Me in this house, which bears My Name, and say, “We are safe”—safe to do all these detestable things?  Has this house, which bears My Name, become a den of robbers to you? But I have been watching! declares the LORD. Go now to the place in Shiloh where I first made a dwelling for My Name, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of My people Israel. While you were doing all these things, declares the LORD, I spoke to you again and again, but you did not listen; I called you, but you did not answer. Therefore, what I did to Shiloh I will now do to the house that bears My Name, the temple you trust in, the place I gave to you and your ancestors. I will thrust you from my presence, just as I did all your fellow Israelites, the people of Ephraim. So do not pray for this people nor offer any plea or petition for them; do not plead with Me, for I will not listen to you. Do you not see what they are doing in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? The children gather wood, the fathers light the fire, and the women knead the dough and make cakes to offer to the Queen of Heaven. They pour out drink offerings to other gods to arouse My anger. But am I the one they are provoking? declares the LORD. Are they not rather harming themselves, to their own shame? Therefore this is what the Sovereign LORD says: My anger and my wrath will be poured out on this place—on man and beast, on the trees of the field and on the crops of your land—and it will burn and not be quenched." Amen and amen.

Although Jeremiah has been hard for me to get through I have been blessed with the knowledge of how long suffering God was with the children of Abraham. God's promise to Abraham was a serious promise which God intended to keep, however instead of Abraham's descends being faithful like their forefather, they continued to put other gods before the One and Only True God. Despite their behavior God continued to send prophets to them to get them to change their behavior of putting other gods before Him. Sound familiar?  We, Christians, are the House that Bears the Name of our Lord and yet many of us continue to worship other gods instead of the One and Only; we worship power, money, prestige, knowledge, fairness, outward beauty--all those lessor gods that cannot sustain us in eternity. And yet God never stops trying to convince us to turn to Him so that we can be the Light to a very Dark World.

Over the past several weeks I have been practicing the behavior of not trusting in my own instincts and knowledge when confronted by challenges. I have been, instead, asking God to get into the middle of my circumstance and just leaving my problems at His feet. I have not been disappointed and find myself less burdened and more fulfilled and able to be happy. This freedom is soooooo refreshing; I want this freedom for all of us. The stress that we take on ourselves looking for fulfillment in all the wrong places will age us prematurely. The Love of God will keep us young and vibrant; His way will protect this House of God if only I turn my heart and attention to Him! From the smallest simplest issue to those that might be life limiting, turn your heart, head and hand to Him to be free to love Him first and then your neighbor as your self.

Now may the LORD bless you and keep you; may the LORD make His face shine on you and be gracious to you; may the LORD turn His face toward you and give you peace.

Stephanie