My Bright Morning Star

Earlier I was thinking about the fact that one day there will be no enemy taunting us (for those of us in Christ). No more death, no more evil, no more sin nature. Think about what life would be like without all of the spiritual forces of darkness. A place where we will no longer walk in darkness, where there will be no need for the sun because the LORD will be our light. A place where we are never rejected...His gates will never close. A place where we are fully known and loved to the core and the thing is...we will operate out of that love and security to the fullest extent. And Jesus will be all that we need. No more hunger, no more poverty, no widows, no children left without a father, no more victims, no more jealousy, no more adultery. If I am banking on the fact that Jesus is the word made flesh to dwell among us...then what He speaks is truth and what He says will be accomplished. Nothing will go undone. Every wrong will be made right. He is just too much! There are so many times that the Lord has gone out of His way to allow me to see Him work in my life and in others. Listen, if you are a skeptic and don't believe the bible is relevant you need to camp out a while in the book of Daniel. Let me just say that the more I come to know the more I realize that I don't know. His word is a glorious masterpiece! Back to Daniel was given words of prophecy and so many of them have been fulfilled through what we would call history. Every i will be dotted and every t crossed.





So a couple of hours have passed before I have been able to get back to my post. I was on the couch typing this earlier and a Chris Tomlin song was playing and I was so busy lifting one hand in praise and trying to peck at the keys at the same time. Rod looks at me and doesn't really say anything but I know he thinks I am weird (he has thought that for years now I am sure...haha). I just hope to never go out and worship in public when I am not doing so in private. Yet the rocks were going to cry out if I did not praise Him. Morgan came running in singing Hosanna! She then ran out of the house proclaiming: "Hosanna in the Highest!" Cracked me up. He must have been ordaining some praise!



Anyway, I am so ticked off. So many of you know that we lost one of our best friends recently. He was our brother in Christ and he was very precious to us. I have no doubt at all that he was a believer hands down. Yet those of us who are left are here rehearsing a million things in our minds of "what ifs" and "what could we have done?" It still seems unfathomable to think that our friend for the last decade would commit suicide. You can read about that HERE click on the link which will re-direct you to my old wordpress. I have thought about it all every day for the last couple of months. I still can't believe it. It was so final and so tragic. He is missed so much. I feel so bad for his wife. This is not how things were supposed to be.



A girl I went to school with lost her daughter a few days ago. She was playing in the neighbors driveway and they backed up not knowing she was there and it took her life. I hate that it is this way. We just weren't meant for death. I think that is why it is the final enemy to be swallowed up.



I was thinking about Steven Curtis Chapman and their precious daughter that is now in heaven. Then, another friend that I went to school with was in a bad wreck and it claimed the life of her 2 year old and she was so injured that she is still recovering in rehab.



My little sister was driving down the road with her husband and they came up on a wreck that had just happened. The grandad was in his truck with three kids and he was not wearing his seat belt. The kids were not in a car seat either. A car pulled out and they collided. These children saw their grandfather and legal guardian get killed. They saw his mangled body under the truck as they screamed for their mommy and daddy. So tragic.



Not to be morbid but the older I get the more I realize how much suffering so many people are going through. What in the world do we do with all of this?

Numbers 24:17 says: "I see him, but not now; I behold him, but not near. A star will come out of Jacob a scepter will rise out of Israel." If we are going to make it with an ounce of victory we have to keep our eyes on the bright morning star. He will give us signs of His presence and He will guide us to the end of our days. Sometimes confusion creeps in because we take our eyes off of Him. Our despair can turn into doubt. Let me tell you when our friend took his life it made me want to think about heaven even more. I felt as if a rug was pulled out from underneath me, leaving a pang of sorrow in its wake. I was so jealous for him with a godly jealousy. I know what it is like to suffer. Those of you who have been in any of my bible studies know that the Lord allowed the enemy to SIFT ME LIKE WHEAT! I NEVER EVER want to go back to that type of school as long as I live. Boy did I learn some things the hard way, yes! I still sought God through it all but it was one of the scariest times of my entire life. So yes I could share in my friends sufferings because I was well acquainted with it myself. I prayed fervently for him to be set free. Yet he gave up and no longer fought the good fight. Was that God's will for him to kill himself, No! But is he in heaven, yes!
**PAUSE** I have my praise music (it is just filling my house with praise) on and I can't contain the feelings of praise it stirs in me. I can't even sit down. Praise the Lord!

Anyway, why didn't the Lord heal my friend of what he was going through? God WILL NOT force us into obedience and He certainly will not force us into the spacious place of our promised land in Christ. He died to set us free but as a sign reads in Washington: FREEDOM IS NOT FREE. He was our ransom, yet we are going to have to believe Him and fight the good fight to cross over our spiritual Jordan's. We have to claim that ground and take back what the enemy has stolen. We will have to work intentionally to be free of hindrances in this cosmos.

Lord, help us to fix our eyes on You!

Back in the day before we got all technical, people had to focus on the skies to get them through the sea. (I can't imagine a life without motion sickness meds...just sayin') Seafaring people would watch the sun to tell whether they were headed east or west. They could also use the night sky to navigate their position. The stars were fixed references and served as instruments to guide.

"Remember that the morning star was considered the harbinger of dawn (a harbinger is a sign of things to come). When Jesus called himself the bright Morning Star, he was saying that he is our reference point--the sign that a new day is dawning on the world. Scripture tells us that this will be a day that will never end. Its light will be so steady, strong, and fixed that darkness will finally be banished from the earth. No more sin, no more sorrow, no more tears. If the first coming of Jesus is like the star that announces the dawn, his second coming will be like lighting, bringing the swift fulfillment of his kingdom.

Like the ancient mariners, who were able to read the skies, we need to remember to look up, to lift our faces to the Bright Morning Star, because it is only when Jesus is our reference point that we understand our true location in space and time.

Jesus faulted the religious leaders of his day for failing to interpret the signs of the times. Let us pray today for the grace to be like wise seafarers, joyful when they saw the morning star rising in the east." (Praying the Names of Jesus, Spangler)

Morgan and I have been going outside, laying towels out, and laying on the concrete to look at the stars. Last night she anticipated it so much that she was literally outside having a count down for it to get dark. It is good to consider the heavens and the work of His fingers. She and I talk about God and how He knows each star by name. He is truly awesome in power.

Psalm 8:2-4
2 From the lips of children and infants
you have ordained praise [a]
because of your enemies,
to silence the foe and the avenger.

3 When I consider your heavens,
the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars,
which you have set in place,

4 what is man that you are mindful of him,
the son of man that you care for him?
So as I conclude I almost tremble but we are just going to have to suffer here, figuratively speaking this world to me is outside of the gate that is to come. So, let us go to Him outside the camp, bearing disgrace because it is so momentary. I am not discounting pain but I am saying we have to go to His throne now since this world is not our "enduring city" because we are looking for the city that is to come with whose architect and builder is the Lord.

Hebrews 13:12-14 (New International Version)
12And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood. 13Let us, then, go to him outside the camp, bearing the disgrace he bore. 14For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come.