Tag: David

Posted in Living in Today's World, Trusting God

Itsy Bitsy Spider

Posted on by Streim

spider web

I read a true story about a man who was totally distraught over some bills that were due. In the midst of his panic, he remembered an experience he had as a World War II soldier fighting in the South Pacific. 

He became separated from his comrades, and some enemy soldiers spotted him. In his attempt not to be caught, he scrambled through the jungle on the island and managed to wedge himself inside a tiny cave. Being a Christian, he prayed, “God, please protect me.”

In that moment, he noticed a little spider started to spin a web at the mouth of the cave. For the next 30 minutes, while his enemies searched nearby caves, he watched that wee little spider spin a web completely over the opening of the cave.  Eventually, the enemy soldiers appeared at the mouth of the cave!  In an instant, they retreated.  The enemy soldiers realized nobody would go into a cave if a spider web covered the entrance!

The man allowed the distress about his bills overwhelm him.  He needed a reminder that God is always faithful to His children. God faithfully protected him in a situation that had been much worse— and He did it with a tiny spider!

Each night before I go to sleep, I’ve been reading one Psalm.  I started several days ago… and last evening when I read David’s third Psalm, I rejoiced.   David wrote this psalm while he was running from his own son Absalom.
Psalm 3: 1-8
” Lord, how they have increased who trouble me! Many are they who rise up against me. Many are they who say of me, “There is no help for him in God.” Selah  But You, O Lord, are a shield for me, My glory and the One who lifts up my head.  I cried to the Lord with my voice, And He heard me from His holy hill. Selah  I lay down and slept; I awoke, for the Lord sustained me.  I will not be afraid of ten thousands of people Who have set themselves against me all around.  Arise, O Lord; Save me, O my God! For You have struck all my enemies on the cheekbone; You have broken the teeth of the ungodly. Salvation belongs to the Lord. Your blessing is upon Your people. Selah”
 
May you be blessed today and always; if you are a true adopted, blood bought Child of the Father in heaven; in knowing He is faithful beyond our human comprehension.   No matter how difficult the situation may seem our LORD God is with us through it.♥Streim
Posted in Lessons from the Holy Bible, Living in Today's World

Watch Where You’re Going!

Posted on by Streim

We often hear stories of someone who was using his/her cell phone to text a message while driving and it resulted in an accident.  Living in this age of “techno-everything”, thirty-nine states and the District of Columbia have created laws prohibiting texting while driving.  Some states prohibit drivers from using cell phones or other hand-held devices at all while driving.  In the most simplistic sense, laws serve the primary purpose of providing a sense of order to protect people from being harmed or harming others.

Our Almighty LORD God  set all things in order from the creation until now.  However, we humans seem to think sometimes that we have a better way than our Father and Lord Jesus.  In the long Psalm (as some refer to it) 119 we find so much, but today I’d like to just examine the vital “precepts given from heaven”.  The importance of the Word to guide us in our everyday walk with the Lord.

Psalm 119: 100-106 “I understand more than the aged, for I keep your precepts (**laws, rules, guidelines**).  I hold back my feet from every evil way, in order to keep your word.  I do not turn aside from your rules, for you have taught me(3).  How sweet are your words to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth!  Through your precepts I get understanding; therefore I hate every false way.  Your word is a lamp(1) to my feet and a light to my path (2).  I have sworn an oath and confirmed it, to keep your righteous rules.

Imagine yourself on vacation in a beautiful countryside resort.  You had a pleasant day with the family and go to bed thankful for such a relaxing day.   Suddenly you’re awakened by a loud clap of thunder followed by a fierce storm.  The wind roared, the rain poured but all seemed well until the power went out. There you were in complete darkness!   You stumbled out of bed , tripped over your own shoes by the side of the bed and banged your shin on a table in the middle of the room before you found the door.  Finally, some light… or so you thought.  Nope just darkness!  No outdoor light, no stars or moon and you had no idea which way lead to the resort’s office.   You stood there in dark silence thinking “If I only came prepared and brought a flashlight and a lantern with me.”

It’s impossible to see in the darkness without light.  It’s impossible to pay attention to where we are going when we distracted by texting on a cell while driving. 

I envision the Word as a  flashlight in one hand and a lantern in the other hand.  The flashlight to keep my attention on where I step (1) and the lantern to light the path ahead (2).   But I must pay attention to where I am going at all times (3).

 

“This book (the Bible) will keep you from sin or sin will keep you from this book.” 

Dwight L. Moody

Posted in Finding Comfort, Listening To God, Living in Today's World, Praise and Worship, The Joy of His Love, Time for Sharing

Is Confession Good For The Soul?

Posted on by Streim

Confession leads to forgiveness, but what does that look like?  The picture is presented to us in a wonderful way in Psalm 51.  The results of forgiveness are a clean heart, a renewed spirit, a restored relationship with God and the joyful experience of God’s salvation.  God “cleans us up”, makes us “presentable to Him” and “reorients us toward Himself” and helping us to focus on that which is right.  When God forgives us, HE crosses over the deep canyon that separates us from Him.  When you put all of this together~~there is much cause to be joyful!  Forgiveness is truly more than a theological principle…it makes our salvation a very personal experience with Almighty God, Creator of all things!  It takes all the wrong things in our life and makes them right in our Father’s eyes.


Psalm 51: 10-17

10)* Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. **11) Cast me not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from me. ***12) Restore to me the joy of your salvation, and uphold me with a willing spirit. 13) Then I will teach transgressors your ways, and sinners will return to you. ****14) Deliver me from blood guiltiness, O God, O God of my salvation, and my tongue will sing aloud of your righteousness. 15)  O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth will declare your praise.  16)  For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; you will not be pleased with a burnt offering. *****17)  The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

~references from Psalm 51 and other Scriptures of importance~

* Ezekiel 18:31
  “Cast away from you all the transgressions that you have committed, and make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit! Why will you die, O house of Israel?”
**Luke 11:13
“If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
***2 Corinthians 12-18
 “Since we have such a hope, we are very bold, not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face so that the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end. But their minds were hardened. For to this day, when they read the old covenant, that same veil remains , because only through Christ is it taken away. Yes, to this day whenever Moses is read a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.  And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord,are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit”
**** Ezekiel 33:8
 “If I say to the wicked, O wicked one, you shall surely die, and you do not speak to warn the wicked to turn from his way, that wicked person shall die in his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand.”
***** Psalm 34:18
The LORD is near to the brokenhearted and saves the crushed in spirit.
Isaiah 57:15
“For thus says the One who is high and lifted up, who inhabits eternity, whose name is Holy: ‘I dwell in the high and holy place, and also with him who is of a contrite and lowly spirit, to revive the spirit of the lowly, and to revive the heart of the contrite.'”
Isaiah 66:2
 “All these things my hand has made, and so all these things came to be, declares the LORD. But this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*****~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~*****~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


To me joy is an honest Spirit-filled overwhelming awareness of the grace of God in my life.