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Gleanings From The Word

Tag: Christian living

  • A Decaying Legacy

    A Decaying Legacy

    Our true legacy is in Christ

    old pier posts on Fraser River - a legacy of times gobe by. Where is your legacy?

    There isn’t much left of this old pier on the Fraser River. A few  nearly rotted-out pilings mark the spot where it once stood. What was its story?

    Was it used to moor small craft? For logging? Fisheries? All are possibilities along this stretch of the river. It once served a purpose, but now it sits largely forgotten and will eventually decay, slowly rotting away until nothing remains to show it was ever there.

    Places like these, along with old abandoned buildings, capture my imagination. I wonder what their story was, and long to hear the tales they could tell if they could speak.

    Alas, they remain silent, unable to share their history and legacy. As I pondered the ruins, I wondered what my legacy would be. How will I be remembered? It’s a natural question.

    Few of us leave a legacy that lasts more than a couple of generations. Of all the billions of people who have ever lived, relatively few have left behind a mark remembered more than two or three generations. Even most of those faded into obscurity over the long haul. 

    Wealthy individuals spend fortunes to ensure their names live on in hospitals, libraries, and sports stadiums. Yet those things are eventually replaced, renamed, or fall into ruins.

    While it would be nice, in a way, to leave a legacy here on earth that lasts forever, it’s not going to happen.

    I hope that the legacy of my life results in a few words from Jesus when I arrive in glory.

    In Matthew’s gospel, Jesus tells a parable about a master who entrusts some currency to some servants. Two of the servants are faithful to invest it well, but the third does not.

    To the servants who were faithful, Jesus says, 

    His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.’ Mathew 25:21 ESV

    I long to hear those words. In truth, I haven’t always been faithful, and the times I have been, it was only with this help. Still, I long to please the one who died to save me.

    My performance won’t impact my salvation. We are saved by grace, through faith in His finished work. Yet He loved me enough to die for me, how else can I show my gratitude?

    I pray that your legacy is to hear the Lord say, “Well done, good and faithful servant.”

    Be blessed

    Hallelu Yah / Praise God 

    Kevin

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  • Sealed – Holy Spirit Guaranteed

    Sealed – Holy Spirit Guaranteed

    artists conception of Noah's ark

    One of the things that always amazes me is how often we miss  critical details when we read familiar Bible stories. It may be because we have heard or read them so often that we don’t actually read them.

    Let me cite a couple of examples from the account of Noah and the flood.

    How many animals did Noah allow into the ark? Most people will say that’s easy. It’s two; he brought the animals onboard two by two.

    The Bible has a different answer.

    Then the Lord said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation. Take with you seven pairs of all clean animals, the male and his mate, and a pair of the animals that are not clean, the male and his mate, and seven pairs of the birds of the heavens also, male and female, to keep their offspring alive on the face of all the earth. Genesis 7:1-3 ESV

    There are pairs, seven pairs for clean animals and birds and a single pair for the unclean.

    How did the Ark stay afloat when everything else, including boats, was destroyed?

    Was it the construction? God gave very explicit instructions about how to build it.

    And God said to Noah, “I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence through them. Behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make yourself an ark of gopher wood.Make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and out with pitch. This is how you are to make it: the length of the ark 300 cubits,its breadth 50 cubits, and its height 30 cubits. Make a roof for the ark, and finish it to a cubit above, and set the door of the ark in its side. Make it with lower, second, and third decks.  Genesis 6:13-16 ESV

    That may be part of the reason, but the larger portion of the answer is recorded elsewhere.

    And those that entered, male and female of all flesh, went in as God had commanded him. And the Lord shut him in. Genesis 7:16 ESV

    The ark remained afloat, keeping its inhabitants safe because the Lord sealed them in and the flood out.

    The Lord who sealed the ark for Noah, thus protecting Him, is the same Lord who seals us when we are Christians. It’s why Paul could say with confidence,

    Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.”No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. Romans 8:35-37 ESV

    Jesus put it this way:

    I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all; no one can snatch them out of my Father’s hand. John 10:28-29 ESV

    Believers are sealed in by God. What a blessing.

    Be blessed

    Hallelu Yah / Praise God 

    Kevin

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