The Lazy Orange Cat: June 19th Devotional

      

The Lazy Orange Cat

June 19th Devotional

Proverbs 13:4

      On this day in 1978, the cartoon Garfield appeared for the first time. Garfield was found in the funny pages of over 40 newspapers. Garfield was created by an Indiana cartoonist named Jim Davis. Jim Davis was a graduate of Ball University and was a well-known cartoonist but none of his successes could compare with Garfield. Garfield was born on this day in Mama Leone's Italian restaurant, which might explain the love for Italian food in this orange tabbies life. Garfield began eating them out of house and home causing him to go to the pet shop. He was eventually adopted by a cartoonist named Jon Arbuckle who had a dog named Odie. Despite their disagreements, Garfield, Jon, and Odie became lifelong friends. Garfield will always be remembered as a lazy, fat, cynical cat who loves to eat almost any food (especially lasagna) but not raisins. Garfield was also well-known for his ability to watch TV and take long naps. Other than his favorite pastimes of eating and sleeping he enjoyed kicking dogs off kitchen tables, shipping cute kittens to Abu Dhabi, and tormenting the local mailman. There were a few things that Garfield has not enjoyed over the years. He always had an aversion with Mondays, despised exercises, avoided the veterinarian Liz, and could not bear cute kittens named Nermal. Over the course of the last 40 plus years, Garfield has enjoyed not just time in the newspaper but also multiple TV shows, two movies, and more cat merchandise in cars than you could ever imagine.

      Garfield just wouldn't be Garfield unless he was lazy, and while that is cute for an orange cartoon cat it is not a trait that we as Christians should desire to follow. The Bible speaks frequently about the value of hard work. In the book of Genesis, we find that God created work and deems it as good. The opposite of hard work is laziness which the scripture tells us is a sin. Proverbs 13:4 says The soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing, while the soul of the diligent is richly supplied. A sluggard is a lazy person who has the same desires as other people but does nothing, and since he does nothing he gets nothing. But the opposite is true for the diligent man, for the hard-working individual. The hard-working individual performs his best knowing that his work honors God and in turn, God blesses honest hard work. Take a moment and examine your life, would you label yourself as a hard worker, or are you slothful. God will only bless one. Be that one.

The Raider of Death: June 12th Devotional

      

The Raider of Death

June 12th Devotional

Romans 3:25

      On this day in 1981, the blockbuster hit Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark premiered. The film was directed by Steven Spielberg and was based on a story written by George Lucas. The star of the movie was Indiana Jones who was portrayed by Harrison Ford. Ford had already become a household name by playing Han Solo in Lucas's Star Wars trilogy. Indiana Jones was a renown archeologist/adventurer who worked for Marshal College. Jones specialized in finding the rarest and most precious of artifacts in the most impossible of situations. While teaching, two army officials approach Indy asking him to find the Ark of the Covenant. At that time the Nazis were in hot pursuit of the ark and were being led by Jones's archenemy Rene Belloq. Apparently, Hitler was obsessed with the occult and he thought that having the ark would give him supernatural power. This was a battle of good versus evil and the clock was now ticking against him. The chase begins in the snowy country of Nepal to look for a piece of the staff of Ra. While there he runs into an old friend, Marion Ravenwood and in typical Jones fashion, a fight breaks out between himself and the Nazis, resulting in the burning of Marion's establishment. The two quickly race to Tanis Egypt where they were eventually successful in obtaining the Ark (despite a run-in with some snakes) until Belloq stole it from them. The battle continues as an epic car chase ending with Jones and Marion tied up while the Nazis attempted to extract the power of the ark. This failed miserly killing them all but Indy and Marion.

      The film raked in nearly 400 million dollars, and adjusting for inflation makes this one of the most profitable movies of all time. Four more movies would be released, a TV series, book series, and the Raiders movie is placed in the national film registry. The theme of the movie centers on the Ark of the Covenant. The Ark was created by God's design. It was a chest inlaid in gold that held the ten commandments among other important items from the time of wandering. Atop the ark were two golden Cherub angels with their wings touching. The ark was carried by the Levites and was placed in the Holy of Holies in the Tabernacle. Once a year, on the day of atonement, the high priest would enter to place the blood of an animal on the Ark, symbolizing that the people's sin was covered. But there is no longer an ark, Tabernacle, nor blood sacrifice. How can man's sin be atoned/forgiven? The Bible says in Romans 3:25 whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. The who is Jesus. He shed His blood as our propitiation. What does that big term mean? It means to appease someone. Jesus took the full hammer blow of God's wrath for us, to propitiate or appease the price of God. Incredibly the Greek word for propitiation is the same Greek word used for the Mercy Seat of the Old Testament! Christ is literally the Mercy Seat of God, the one in whom alone rests the power to forgive man's sin... And everyone is invited to this Mercy Seat. You don't need Indiana Jones to find Jesus.

Reception or Rejection: June 5th Devotional

Reception or Rejection

June 5th Devotional

Luke 19:41-44      

      On this day in 70 AD, the Roman general Titus broke through the middle wall of Jerusalem. Titus was the son of Emperor Vespasian. He was an extremely talented military commander, having seen service in Germany and Britain. In 66 AD he and his father commanded multiple Roman legions during the first Jewish Roman war. Vespasian was called back to Rome to become the Caesar leaving Titus to battle a group of Jews who refused to submit to Rome. The Jewish zealots had been causing a tremendous amount of problems for Rome and Rome was determined to bend their hearts or break their spirits. In April of the same year, Titus took the 5th, 12th, and 15th Roman legions to lay siege against Jerusalem. The siege started 3 days prior to the Passover, which meant that the city would have been filled to capacity with pilgrims to worship God. The Roman legions continued an attempt to starve out the city until an attack was made. The Jewish zealots were greatly outnumbered, with over 70000 highly trained and skilled Roman soldiers against less than 20,000 Jewish soldiers. Today marks the day that Titus broke down the middle wall of Jerusalem but the siege would not end for another 3 months with the burning of David's city, the utter destruction of the second temple, and an estimated 1.1 million non-combatant Jewish people dead. Years after his victory Titus would become the emperor of Rome from 79 to 81 being the first son to take the throne from his biological father.

      The siege on Jerusalem caused the Jewish people to be displaced from their Homeland for nearly 1900 years. It was a shocking event at that time but not shocking to God. Jesus prophesied about this event in Luke 19:41-44 which says And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.” At that moment Jesus was preparing for His sacrifice on the cross and we find tears coming from His eyes, not for what lays ahead for Him but for what lays ahead for a city full of people that had rejected Him. Jesus desired that none of them would perish and be without Him. He desired to bring them close like a mother hen does her chicks. He loved them and He came to save them. Likewise today God does not take pleasure in the death of the wicked, but instead, God desires that all men will come to repentance and trust him. Rejection brings about tears to the eyes of the savior, but reception brings joy in heaven. Have you rejected or received Him? There is no middle ground.

Reflections on the Beach: Rainy Days

Reflections on the Beach

Week thirteen

"Rainy Days"

Focus Text: Hebrews 13

      Nothing puts a damper on a beach vacation quite like a rainy day.  The family sits in their swim trunks, all lathered up with sunscreen, ready to tackle the sand only to hear the crack of thunder.  The dark clouds roll in and start to pour rain.  The smiles turn upside down.  The rain streaks across the window as the family wonders, what do we do now?  What is plan B?  Is there a plan B?  Do we sit and watch the same tv shows we could watch at home (I'm game for watching the Andy Griffth show anytime)?  Do we play board games?  Do we take a nap?  Do we simply stare at each other?  No matter what, we need to change plans.  

      Life demands that we change plans from time to time.  We don't like it, as a matter of fact, we begrudgingly go along with it out of necessity.  Our world is a fully revolving door of changes.  Nothing typically goes to plan because we can't see what the future will bring.  We don't have a 'crystal ball' to see what will happen tomorrow.  Thankfully in a world full of change, there is a God who never changes.  He remains faithful, His attributes are constant.  Hebrews 13:8 says that "Jesus Christ is the  same yesterday and today and forever."  Why doesn't God have to change?  Why can Jesus stay the same?  The reason why is because God is omniscient, He is all-knowing.  He sees the past, present, and future all with one glimpse of the eye.  While we are scrambling looking for plan B's because the plan A's of our life implode, we can still rest in a soverign God who remains a lone constant.  God's love will not change, His mercy will not change, His tender kindness will not change, His grace will not change, His holiness nor His justice change.

Reflection on the Road:

Maybe you are enduring a time in your life of seemingly unending change.  Maybe it's job, an empty nest, recently losing a spouse, moving, etc.  Your life feels like its in upheaval.  Let your anchor, in the midst of change, be God, who changes not.  May the words of the old hymn, Great is Thy Faithfulness encourage your soul:

Thou changest not, thy compassions, they fail not;

as thou hast been, thou forever wilt be.