Brain Teaser, Wednesday May 5th

[cjwood]

And I thought Moe was the wisest. Not the same page; oh! okay.

absolutely hysterical roy! made me laugh outloud. a pure and hearty laugh is like medicine. thanks bra!

claudia

[judith collier]

Arcturus, I see a good part of this, the NOT accomplishing part of Solomon. And the part wherby Christ gives us the overcoming.  What confuses me is the 'plan of God to admonish us
But if God doesn't deal with us according to our iniquities (and this was way back in the time of psalms) then how is it that He admonishes us? Does God just keep heaping more on us even after suffering our consequences like David?
This isn't sounding too clear here but how does one determine if a Christian has accomplished?
Is it by keeping the faith? Did Solomon keep the faith even though he messed up. I know David did and this was David's son.
I know people couldn't save themselves back then but it sure appears God admonished them.
I don't even know what the question is now!!! But hopefully you can translate.
It sounds a bit like the old covenant had no mercy but that's not true.
Yikes, Judy

[Deborah-Leigh]

I hear you Judy. I know your pain and your cry is a cry of anguish, and is dear to the heart of God Who is Love.

I can receive your pain into my own soul for in this way we rise  into a life in Christ. Breathing in the heartache of  pain not the stony hearts of denial or the self justified thoughts of law makers appeasing their fears with self gratifying agreement that you get only what you ask for and boy oh boy, they asked for it! Or, you get what you choose or you reap what you sow and you are blind because of the sin of your parents. Oh no! Not that. You are in the state you are in for the Glory of God! God is your cause, purpose plan and salvation. This Is how to receive the brethren. It is not to go and give a cookie to a serial killer locked up in maximum security or giving a sermon to poor hopeless widows. See God is all in all.

People refuse and recoil from seeing God in the epicenter of every crime, sorrow, loss, grief and death as having been authored by a Sovereign God who is not aloof or doting on peace meal platitudes of Oh I will pray for you or I'll light a candle for you, or shed a tear for you or in the case of the one who can not tolerate such pain and turns away and prefers to thinking on those things only that bring a sense of unreality and partiality that bars out the God of all, doing all, causing all and Sovereign over all. Do you fight against every vitriolic attack on your comforts with feelings of satisfaction embracing thoughts of returned violence and vengeance towards your enemies and you wonder at the other parts of the world that are being drowned burned and violated by unrelenting waves of aggression and corruption.  I know you don't Judy. Do  you see God in the centre of your circumstances right there with you on your cross. The thief who sees God in the centre of pain, is the one who is assured the Paradise of God, not in the duration of the suffering but certainly upon the endurance of it in the mindset of the one who sees God in the moment of grief. They receive that  assurance that can only come from God right there next to you ~  that release from pain and death is reserved in heaven for such  souls who cry to God and recognize Him.

What can anyone do for you or I. Can you make me live longer laugh harder or cry less? Can you unhinge the pain centre of the human brain or stop the circuit of agony in the veins of flesh? No. Only God can do anything at all. Others will spit, throw stones, go home to their TV or other form of entertainment that God authors for them that may even take them into addictions of despair and deeper poverty of mind to try to forget, as they  wage war on forgetfulness not being anywhere to be found because God is there in the face, getting bigger, bolder, better and the pain gets worse as death gets nearer.

Have you seen the unconscious in the streets that walk into you or take your parking? They are willingly unconscious of you and I. They care only to safe guard their own feelings. So they do battle a  battle with Hades.  We see them and meet them as sent to burn off our skins and whip lash our souls as was the very flesh of Christ scourged with the blasting leather thongs tipped in iron blades that cut against His Body as happens to ours.

I know your cry Judy. I know your pain. No forsaking you but right there with you, helplessly nailed to my own cross authored for me, right up next to you and others who are crying too, not against, God but to God. Your pain is mine too, and  that by contrast is small compared to the writhing thrashing vengeful humanity pressed against the goads of carnal dissatisfactions.

God controls everything and everyone and oh The carnal mind refuses and recoil from seeing God in the epicenter of every crime, sorrow, loss, grief and death as having been authored by a Sovereign God who is not aloof or doting on peace meal platitudes of Oh I will pray for you or I'll light a candle for you, or shed a tear for you or in the case of the one who can not tolerate such pain and turns away and prefers to thinking on those things only that bring a sense of unreality and partiality that bars out the God of all, doing all, causing all and Sovereign over all. How it hurts. I know. I know. It happens to me too dear sister. God is there, and here, and inside the core of our suffering, author and finisher of our Faith.

It is human to avoid pain. It is Godly to feel it.

Mat 24:12  And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. Mat 24:13  But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

Arc

[judith collier]

Mark, admonish, the definition has nothing to do with encouraging. I do see where my idea of admonishment was more like the word rebuke. Admonish is a more gentler reminder of a fault. So, when I was thinking more like rebuke I saw it as God coming down like lightening and scouraging the living whatever out of us.
Thought that was a bit too much! But to warn us and gently move us in another direction, I can handle.
I also see where your encouraging statement of the written word and the salvation of the cross is coming from.
Thanks, Judy

[judith collier]

Arc, now I see where the accomplishment comes from, comes from the indwelt Christ who gives us the desire and then ACCOMPLISHES it. So, Solomon didn't accomplish saving himself with his wisdom. God made him for judgement and not His glory.
Obviously Arc you sensed something amiss in me and did ADMONISH (my new understanding of it) me in a very supportive and understanding way. I think i know where i was coming from now. It is very easy to turn away from God to the world for answers. The promise though is that God will fulfill the original desire He put in us and work it out.
Going about trying to save one's life (thanks soberxp) from hardships is not the answer. Losing one's life for the sake of the gospel and God's glory at times is almost like a fairy tale. One cannot deny the biblical answer but the flesh sure puts up a fight. Over and over God calls but is ignored because the mind is brainwashed by misery and surely we think, God will just bestow more as if we comprehended God's thoughts. Surrending goes up for debate. Someone on this thread said to the effect, not verbatim, think with your HEART when the wisdom of one's wordly seeking mind does not bring relief. The heart knows it's Master.
Good answer. Thanks All!

[Deborah-Leigh]

Arc, now I see where the accomplishment comes from, comes from the indwelt Christ who gives us the desire and then ACCOMPLISHES it.

Php 2:13  For it is God Himself whose power creates within you the desire to do His gracious will and also brings about the accomplishment of the desire.

Yes Judy. That is what the Scriptures say. God gives us the desire and He gives us the accomplishment of the desire He gives us. There are two actions in the Scripture quoted. The first is Desire and the second is the Accomplishment. God gives both.

So, Solomon didn't accomplish saving himself with his wisdom.

There is a lesson right there in that fact.  

God made him for judgement and not His glory.

All will be judged ~  the righteous AND the unrighteous.


I believe and see that God will not permit His Glory to be tainted, corrupted or in any way manipulated by carnal man. As judgement is fulfilled in us through the purging repenting work that God does to make us into His image, then we begin to have a share in His Glory as the life of Christ grows in us.

2Co 4:6  For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

2Co 3:18  But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.

The culmination of this is when Christ appears to us.

1Pe 5:4  And when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away.

Rom 8:18  For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.

That Glory is the newness of the life  of Christ in us.

Rom 6:4  Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.

Obviously Arc you sensed something amiss in me and did ADMONISH (my new understanding of it) me in a very supportive and understanding way. I think i know where i was coming from now. It is very easy to turn away from God to the world for answers. The promise though is that God will fulfill the original desire He put in us and work it out.

We all have to experience turning away from God, thinking we've got it right and finding out we actually have it wrong, eating humble pie, eating crow pie and feeling the ash on our heads that Job describes to us through his anguish and his pain.

Going about trying to save one's life (thanks soberxp) from hardships is not the answer. Losing one's life for the sake of the gospel and God's glory at times is almost like a fairy tale. One cannot deny the biblical answer but the flesh sure puts up a fight. Over and over God calls but is ignored because the mind is brainwashed by misery and surely we think, God will just bestow more as if we comprehended God's thoughts.

I find that God is the source of our Endurance, and that Endurance is a Fruit of His Spirit I can not grow, attain or deserve. It is a gift and privilege to receive.

Surrending goes up for debate. Someone on this thread said to the effect, not verbatim, think with your HEART when the wisdom of one's wordly seeking mind does not bring relief. The heart knows it's Master.
Good answer. Thanks All!

I find that no words of human consolation can match the Presence of His Quickening Spirit within when there is a need for comfort, understanding and a measure of His Love to assure, balance and encourage. For experience I have found that the best most eloquent words of all our Poets put together, all our songs of Praise, fall empty as vacant hollow vessels without water but promising thirst quenching refreshments, by contrast to our Father Who can at a breeze, give of His Spirit and attach some importance to a bird singing, a caress of kindness found in an unexpected unlooked for place of obscurity and then....I get it...God is the giver of all that is good. I find Him to be surprisingly unpredictable, trustworthy and most kind. He has painfully shown to me that He will not be controlled or taken for granted. When I think I can just tune in to Him at my expectation, whim or fancy, then He's gone! If I think we can find Him by picking up the Bible any time, then He quenches my strenght and sufforcates even my desire to read or pick up the Bible and He vanishes from out of His own Word before my dry stale eyes and hard callused assuming and course heart telling me that God serves me and I've got Him and we can reach Him any time I want, just like I can reach for a glass of water by turning on the faucet. God will not be taken for granted. I learned that the hard way and this lesson happened in my " achy breaky" heart that only the sound, strong, pure Spirit of God strengthens, heals and makes whole.  

Blessings

Arc

[Deborah-Leigh]

. ..... where I continually need to center my focus. ...

I appreciate that you are getting some nourishment of God as He works through me Janine. It is the same for me, the need to center my focus on Him, as well!

Blessings
Arc

[judith collier]

Thanks, Arcturus! Your gift lies in observance, comprehension and the ability to translate that into practicality. An eagle for sure but well grounded. A gleamer who who can make a banquet. A loyal and understanding person who has survived the anvil.
Thank you God for Arcturus!
judy

[Deborah-Leigh]

Hey Judy

I can feel your cup runneth over!

Thanks, Arcturus! Your gift lies in observance, comprehension and the ability to translate that into practicality. An eagle for sure but well grounded. A gleamer who who can make a banquet. A loyal and understanding person who has survived the anvil.
Thank you God for Arcturus!
judy

Isa 41:7  And strengthen doth an artisan the refiner, A smoother with a hammer, Him who is beating on an anvil, Saying, `For joining it is good,' And he strengtheneth it with nails, it is not moved!

Such is the Spirit of Christ. 

We remain as vessels of dust carrying the joy of His Works through His gift to us and great nature and perfection that draws us to the accomplishment He foretells of His Spirit in us.

Joh 17:23  I in them, and Thou in me, that they may be perfected into one, and that the world may know that Thou didst send Me, and didst love them as Thou didst love ME.


Deborah