Who then, can be saved?

Mark 10:16 And he took them up in his arms, put his hands upon them, and blessed them.

Mark 10:17 And when he was gone forth into the way, there came one running, and kneeled to him, and asked him, Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life?

Mark 10:18 And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? there is none good but one, that is, God.

What a question from the Lord Jesus? How pertinent a question of motive and motivation to the heart?

This man came running to Jesus. Jesus questions his motives. At first this seems, a bit abrupt a reception for a commending person? Does He not ask us the same?

What part of God’s goodness do you see in Jesus? This question pierces the heart. We could answer Lord, You are good in beauty and reputation. This may look to us to be true, at one time or another. But there is always a place where God’s goodness repulses our humanity. There is always a place where God’s beauty shames our greatest attempt.

Satan, indeed uses God as a type of mirror to compare himself to. “I will be like God!” His pride declares. This is where I am like God, he boasts.

Perhaps that was the state of this man. Perhaps he, too was saying, “its all good. You are good and I am also of the good sort of person, we should be together?”

So often that is my thought, if not expression. Lord, You are good, and it is good for me to be with You. God always challenges our intention in that sentiment. There is none good, but God. He is good in all ways and He is good in all His acts. But why do I call Him good?

If it is not to see myself as unworthy, it is the faith of demons and the disciples saw this irony, in this incident. If this good guy can’t be saved, calling on You as good, who can be saved? It is impossible, to have any motive, but demon motive, unless the Lord changes the heart to see the deplorable state of your own soul. Riches, especially can blind a person to this sad state and condition of relation with God. Jesus mercifully finds us out and brings us into conformity to Himself, even in our wretched pride and self exaltation.

It is not wrong to run to Jesus. He wants us to make our calling and election sure. When we run to Him, He wants us to know why. He gathers us into His arms and makes us His own dear child and blesses our feeblest effort and expression of love to Himself.

Thank you for trying my heart in motive, dear Jesus, that I may own my love for You.

I do love Thy Kingdom, Lord!

A Prayer for the Restoration of the soul of New YorkWhen I see the movie I Remember Mama, it reminds me of my heritage as coming from an imigrant background. The beauty of the immigrant soul reaching for higher and greater, is obvious in that movie. “Mama” seems to congeal all of the most wholesome aspirations of our immigrant desires. These are some thoughts and prayers for my own soul as I reach to spiritual aspirations and remember the beauty of my great grandparents longings.

I miss the buildings and the look of the NY Skyline. When they panned, the house of Uncle Chris in the last scene of his life, I imagined the buildings in NY. It was harvest time for his soul, the writer seemed to be saying. The corn was off of the stalks and the coolness of the land was upon it and family had gathered to see his soul off to Glory. Do we walk through the city as though it is a full corn maze. The ears of corn are always atop the stalks, so to speak.

I should only love the kingdom of God, on earth like I love my precious city. I love that city, because I have walked it’s fields for years and years in prayer. I have seen the days of sowing and reaping of commodities, bloom and wane and bloom. I have seen it’s bereft soul, seek and search for that which is not water and pay for that which will not satisfy. I have prayed that, as I have found personal solace in the Rock of Ages, that my city would follow me and be saved and be the redeemed upon the earth. I see her here in Ezekiel, probably by superimposing and longing. I love my city, Lord. I do love, thy kingdom, Lord, but, I confess that I have loved my city more. I long that she may be among the Church, my blessed redeemer bought, with His own precious blood.
Not unto us, not because of us, but because of Your promises to raise up and to restore and be gracious to the unthankful and undeserving.

Ezekiel 36:30 And I will multiply the fruit of the tree, and the increase of the field, that ye shall receive no more reproach of famine among the heathen.

Ezekiel 36:31 Then shall ye remember your own evil ways, and your doings that were not good, and shall lothe yourselves in your own sight for your iniquities and for your abominations.

Ezekiel 36:32 Not for your sakes do I this, saith the Lord GOD, be it known unto you: be ashamed and confounded for your own ways, O house of Israel.

Ezekiel 36:33 Thus saith the Lord GOD; In the day that I shall have cleansed you from all your iniquities I will also cause you to dwell in the cities, and the wastes shall be builded.

Ezekiel 36:34 And the desolate land shall be tilled, whereas it lay desolate in the sight of all that passed by.

Ezekiel 36:35 And they shall say, This land that was desolate is become like the garden of Eden; and the waste and desolate and ruined cities are become fenced, and are inhabited.

Ezekiel 36:36 Then the heathen that are left round about you shall know that I the LORD build the ruined places, and plant that that was desolate: I the LORD have spoken it, and I will do it.

Ezekiel 36:37 Thus saith the Lord GOD; I will yet for this be enquired of by the house of Israel, to do it for them; I will increase them with men like a flock.

Ezekiel 36:38 As the holy flock, as the flock of Jerusalem in her solemn feasts; so shall the waste cities be filled with flocks of men: and they shall know that I am the LORD.

IN MY OPINION!

In the Long Gray Line,

It seemed clear that each pagan culture brings an aspect of cultural dominion into their Christian experience.

God so loved the World...that He gave His only begotten Son...

It was as though they were saying that the Irish people, were aware of the spirit of conflict and the effects and usefulness of this in the purposes of God. Conflict is an inextricable part of life after the fall. When the conflict came up, there was some sort of Christian redemption of the conflict that they engaged in, seemingly to make the conflict redemptive and a blessing. I am not privy to the specifics of the Christianization of their conflict in their Irishness. They seemed to include the conflict of their “Ire” into their courting. This seems to be stereotyping, but, I don’t think so. I think that God intends us to have dominion over the spiritual realm and uses culture to weave these spiritual powers under subjection to the Christ of the Church on the earth. Each culture has a responsibility in this realm.

In the way that Adam commissioned Eve to “mother life”. The father, in Gray Line, said, woman take out your power to pray about this. God gave them some sense of the responsibility of the woman in the spiritual realm.
It is a spiritual delegation. Let’s take this conflict into submission, they seem to say.

The Broom of God’s usefulness is given to the Christian woman in the home. Sweeping the dirt out and taking dominion over the spiritual conflicts in the home. Men cannot see this. They cannot see the connection between the milk and the sucking breast and they cannot see the connection between the wringing nose and the blood, as the scripture relates it. Woman, Mother life,
Spiritually, this is the call of motherhood.




I do not allow a woman to teach or to have authority over a man. This is scripture, but the unsaid is, I do not allow a man to nurse a baby and give milk to the infant from his body. I do not allow a man to experience travail of body.

In Gray Line the elderly father seemed to say, is there a travail of soul in this conflict? Let us pray and make the suffering in our family redemptive.

Black people do this culturally. They talk of redemptive suffering, but do not work through conflicts in their homes and more often seek the ease of separation, rather than offering it up as is the cultural inheritance of many generations of in tact families.

We have the inheritance of receiving the faith of our mothers and passing it on. We have cut the family to bits and taken the power of the unified Christian family from the earth, by our greed.

The M in broom is not anathema, it is according to the theme, not the theme of separation as was the witches broom, but the M that is the broom of the at home mother.

We are the Circumcision...

Who worship God in the spirit, and rejoice in Christ Jesus and have no confidence in the flesh Philippians 3:3

When we are in Christ we are a new creature. The Lord has made us new in the foreskin of our hearts. The apostle seems to ask, which side of the circumcision are you on? This seemed very poignant and significant to the Jews. Are you alive in Christ or are you on the dead skin that was removed? Both are holy. One is holy alive and attached to the body and the other is holy dead and in the hand of the rabbi. They could see this analogy.

We have no confidence in the flesh, the apostle reminds us. We can be right there in the holy ordinance and not a part of the living body. Our confidence is not in the fact that we are at the circumcision or in the worship service. We are rejoicing that our relationship is alive in Christ Jesus and not in the orderliness of the function of following the rule of law.

Are we the circumcision, who worship God? Are we the circumcision, who do not worship God? Just the deadness of the law. Are we rejoicing in Christ Jesus? Are we having confidence that we follow the rule of law? Are we attached to the body or in the refuse? Both are a part of the ordinance and one is for life and the use of Christ in the world and the other is for the burning.

From the Valley of Decision "originally 11/4/09"

Evidently, from the perspectives of Valley of Decision, they were blaming the Carnegie methods with the break down of the culture. The commitment of industry to the building of strong families and a strong society was not there. The mom and pops started selling out to the monopolizers. Now, generations later, we are trying to get people to take personal responsibility for their own business. We have exalted the Carnegie method. Dehumanizing business, further and further away from real relationships, so that when we cut, we can look ourselves in the eye and not feel the sense of loss. I like what the writer was illuding to in Valley. The boss realized that there was reason for this disgruntled employee to curse him and he owned it. Understanding that this is a part of the responsibility of wealth. Sometimes being the scapegoat for people's misplaced grief. He did what he could to asuage the pain of this disgruntled and continued, on the other hand pursuing progress. Progress and development is the only way that we can pay the bills to the future generation and the bills of the past generation to care for them during our short stint in leadership of the nation and the world and our families. God will give a good conscience to who will ask Him. We needn't hang our heads, rich or poor. We do what we can and what we must and work for progress: the poor in faith and the rich in industry and job productivity. It is our responsibility one to another to build into the gaps that were not considered in the Carnegie tidal wave season.
We have inherited the claim to pay that we are now so detached from the country and from the production process that we can't find the keys to this car that we are riding in. We must first pray and then accept the responsibility which is ours to be our brothers' keeper and then pursue progress and development.

The earthquake that devastated us and our economy after the Civil War which caused Lloyd's to state Pay All Claims was a warning blast. Be concerned about the truth or be afraid of the consequences. God's mercy is great toward us to guide us when we have lost our way.
We cannot live as though the sky is falling at every CAT. We have to take a hard look at the way of production and progress and pray God that He will restore us, for His glory and for the sake of His people and testimony. God has not brought us this far to kill us in the desert. There is something here for us to do. We have inherited hungry mouths and a hungry country and a hungry world and few minds that can produce the jobs to help people to feed themselves.

As an aside, I saw the open hearth of the steel mills as God's fiery furnace, in this country. God has given us the access in this generation to unprecidented wealth and unprecidented splendor around us. I ask God to come in the productivity of this generation as He came to deliver the Hebrew boys from the fiery furnace. Be present in our productivity, we pray that it would glorify You Lord. God is Sovereign and the only way that we can understand what that means is in the tyrannical people. Nebby was the extreme of this. God is far more sovereign and yet merciful and kind and ...Good! When we see Him exposing His amazing parallel of compassion to us by offsetting a wickedness, by His grace, we are compelled to worship Him aright. The cloud of witnesses bid us to look to Him! Where is He? Commanding and Producing when we are whining and complaining about the fact that we have inherited a debt that we haven't the ability to repay. We mustn't pull the plug, although we are tired of the fight and the blame. Own the responsibility and ask God for the grace to stand and having done all to stand...

Psalm 139:17-24 I love the reasoning of David.

How precious also are thy thoughts unto me, O God! how great is the sum of them!
Psalm 139:18 If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand: when I awake, I am still with thee.
Psalm 139:19 Surely thou wilt slay the wicked, O God: depart from me therefore, ye bloody men.
Psalm 139:20 For they speak against thee wickedly, and thine enemies take thy name in vain.
Psalm 139:21 Do not I hate them, O LORD, that hate thee? and am not I grieved with those that rise up against thee?
Psalm 139:22 I hate them with perfect hatred: I count them mine enemies.
Psalm 139:23 Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:
Psalm 139:24 And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

He remembers that God has shown him that he is dear to God. God has treated David with undeserved kindness and favor, as He has all of us. David pens these thoughts. But, as if an afterthought, David remembers the hatred in his own heart. A fierce and animalistic hatred that arises toward enemies and that seems to grow a concern in his mind. Search me, Lord. He exclaims. I feel justified to hate these enemies and perhaps I would be on that side of Your thoughts, at the times of my sins. Cleanse me thoroughly from my sin. I cannot be justified in my hatred, no matter how much I feel it is so, but Your fierce hatred against the sin of my heart is completely justified.
At that season of redemption, there was no answer to this irony of experience. I am in the loving favor of God and yet my sin still clings to me and is unpaid for. Grace and mercy were clearly not complete. No amount of animal sacrifice can atone for the sin of my soul. Don't let me be on the fierce and hot side of Your anger, with the wicked, Lord. When I remember the grace and the mercy of Your tenderness to my soul, help it to draw me to repentance and faith in the sacrificial work of my Loving Lord Jesus. David was justified through the embrace of this future truth and the acknowledgement that it could not just be because of his relationship to his family lineage. The Lord, is coming, was their faith and the Lord has come, is ours.

Inheriting the Earth! or inheriting the wind?

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven

We have come from a season of inheriting the wind. There is a miseducation of the supposed "fittest". The pride of place that has been our inheritance, because of Darwinism. Our spiritual eyes are blinded by our pride of place.
New York pride is my own personal struggle. I daily pull the weeds of my pride of personal rearing in "the Greatest City in the World".
As I have learned from a quieter and more humble city, God hates pride. Humility is a beautiful thing. Humility of NC doesn't defend itself. Humility of NC doesn't tout itself as so. It, simply, does the right thing and seeks no applause. This is the Bible Belt. That should be something to applaude. The preservation of a city where there is little elicit billboarding, is something to place in high regard.

I love the wrangling and the wrestling of my own city, where the portion of the city, considered "Hell's Kitchen", is preached to and cleansed by the blood of Jesus. That is my history of regard, but, if we don't couple the cleansing power of the fire that Christ has lit in the city that never sleeps, with the preservation disciplines that is the wonder of Charlotte, we will lose our reward and our generation. This, must first be learned and this must then be exported, or imported, {depending on your perspective}.

Grandpa's Hands

Grandpa’s fingers in the flag.

The flag was rolled out and covering the windows of the Pentagon. To me they represented the hands of the patriots. Hands of our fathers, holy hands, we will be true to thee, till death. Our father’s fingers labored over fields, built presses and built from south to north. They are all represented, both the fingers that remained and the fingers that were lost are represented in the flag on the Pentagon. All 5 fingers are there in the Pentagon. All 5 fingers, one handful of concerns represented in the Pentagon. Write the Decalogue on the fingers of your heart, but let the commitment to the flag be a part of your concerns. 2 Fingers worth? Sometimes. Grandpa’s 2 fingers that I looked at longingly. I wanted to kiss the remains of them. He never lingered at their loss, when asked about it. Should I linger at the concerns that my sanity is lessened on 9-11. Like Grandpa did at his 2 fingers. I will work with the three remaining fingers of my mind. Where did your mind go, mother? My mind was lost around, 9-11-01 and I hang the flag over the windows of my mind where the mind used to be. It is dark. It is lost, like Grandpa’s fingers, I use my mind to kiss the memory of my father-in-law’s opened hand, which he raised in praise to God. He lifted the remains of that hand and I lift the remains of my mind to God, in praise and worship. I grieve, the loss. I grieve the flag’s sad memorial. I grieve the losses of lives and parents and heroes and property. I grieve at the deception of lies and deaths and unkindness that hardness of heart can and have the pre eminence. Pre eminent in the season of the demons on the earth; pre eminent until Jesus overcomes them through His Church on the earth. Until the new heavens and the new earth can and do overcome. The rest of the fingers of the mind that remain, give God the glory. The rest of the fingers of my father-in-law, the pattern of raising hands. 5 oclock, they rolled back the flag and showed just the memorial. Minus the flag to mark the date. Remembering that our flag is a portion of our concerns and our patriotism, must follow our Christianity. Our patriotism must follow our family. I heard Amazing Grace, while I looked at my Pentagon, that I pray for. I saw Grandpa telling me that he is enjoying an intact spirit, now. He kissed me through that flag. We were one in the spirit. We are together in worship through hand’s upraised and mind upraised also. Just as he ridiculed my study and I ridiculed his illogical consistency. Praising God, with fingers lost. Worshipping in the face of ignorance. We hold hands today. My mind is with him and his fingers are with me in that flag. I kissed them today. Something that I would never have even asked him, when he was here with us. He loved the flag and he loved his family and he loved, even me, through marriage, {his Dolcinea}. He changed my perspective of my loss. He changed my perception of my country. He changed my perspective of my priorities and now, my loss, is accepted, by me, in praise to my God, to be used to raise to God, as my father-in-law raised those hands to praise His mighty Savior and was that mighty man, on earth in faith that God had made him to be.