Just to let you all know, I have never blogged before. Aside from informal discussions with friends, I have never discussed my spiritual views. With that disclosure, I will attempt to express my thoughts on our recent scripture readings. I've noted how God's own people have repeatedly and persistently practiced paganism and worshipped idols. How easy it is for me to judge them as being absolutley ungrateful for all God has done for them. We live in a community of Christians. We know who our Lord is and would never worship things of wood or metal, made from our own hands. We don't do that. Or do we? We don't blatantly worship with Asherah poles or golden calves. However, when reading about objects of worship made of wood and metal, I can't help but think of two very basic items in our own lives: houses and cars. These are wood and metal objects manufactured by our own hands; two examples, but the list could go on. We live in a society where too often we want bigger and better. Some call this conspicuous consumption, others call it keeping up with the Jones. God has blessed us with prosperity. We no longer spend our lives just trying to survive. We have disposable income for discretionary spending. Depending on the amount of our disposable income, we can buy everything from designer purses, jewelry, the latest fashions, the newest electronic gadgets, the best golf clubs, speed boats, airplanes, additional homes...you get the picture. The fact that ours is a consumer driven economy speaks to the society in which we live. I'm not saying that these things in and of themselves are bad. If we can acquire them, then we have certainly been blessed. But, as Christians we have an important role to fulfill. We need to be mindful of the value we place on our material goods. We are stewards of the blessing we receive. What do our possessions mean to us? We have been so well fed. Are we feeding the orphan and the widow?

July 3

Happy birthday tommorow America!! This will  be my last  blog for a while. I am going on a mission trip with our church to the Czech Republic. It was a little bit random that we were able to go.....I never thought I'd be able to go overseas twice in one year, but God has worked out the details (money, vacation time etc). I am very excited. We will have a couple days to explore Prague and it is supposed to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world. Our church supports a missionary there who, as an outreach to the community, helps run an English camp. We will helping her with this as families come and seek to improve their conversational english. I must admit that compared to some trips I've been on that this one sounds pretty easy. But I have really been stirred to pray more and more as I realize that any time that you seek to represent the Lord, that you are indeed going into 'enemy territory'. So, I would appreciate your prayers to prepare us to witness for the Lord in whatever way He sees fit, that hearts would be prepared and that we would be obedient to participate in any miricle opportunities that He sets up for us! I may be able to get online periodically over there, so I'll keep you posted.

The book of Issaiah is a treasure chest- enjoy and by all means discuss it on the board.

July 1-2

In doing a little 'google' work to sort out which nations are which in the text these last couple days, I found a lot of information about End Times. And of course, many prophesies do have two fulfullments, a 'near one' (which was fulfulled or partially fulfilled shortly after the time it was written and a later fulfillment, often in what we refer to as End Times or the time leading up to Christ's Second Coming). Even though I sit under the teaching of a good friend who is quite the End Time's expert, I will freely admit to you that my brain just does not retain this stuff. So for the most part, I'm not going to even attempt to explain any of the End Times implications of these passages, except to ask you to read it with that idea in mind: that much of it has already been fulfilled shortly after it was written, but much of it still has future implications for us.

I do think that we should be educated about which nations we are talking about, wheather we are talking about past fulfilled prophesy or future prophesy, it's good to know who the 'players' are (this is to the best of my understanding and googling- I'm not an expert)  Assyria (not to be confused with Syria) was an empire which had as it's capital Babylon. A lot of it would be in modern day Iraq. Damascas in Syria, not too far from the northern border of Israel and it has been a enemy to Israel for centuries. Edom is southern Jordon area (Jordon being east of the Jordon River and Dead Sea from Israel). Tyre is in Lebonon which, like Damascus Syria, is near Israel's northern border. According to Forerunner Commentary: Tyre was the New York City of its day, and here God is prophesying of its defeat. Though it would survive, it would be brought into line with God's purpose for Israel. He depicts the commercial merchandising system of this heathen city as harlotry. Tragically, Israel adopted these heathens' attitudes and ways of doing business. Israel has a proclivity for taking an idea or concept from others, refining it, and making it work better than it did for its originators—yet in so doing she rejects God's economic systems.
The ships of Tarshish may have been a 'generic term' for all distant sailing vessles around the Mediterainian. That's not every country/city mentioned, but I think you get the idea that it mostly refers to all who are physically surrounding Israel and the whole Middle East.

I'm not sure what the 'seventy years' (at the end of July 1's reading) refers to (near or distant prophesy or both?) but I know that 70 is an extremely important number in prophetic literature. For now, I am not going to get bogged down in End Times stuff....I'm just trying to get things straight and in order in my head so that I can study more deeply at another time.

A breath of fresh air at the end of July 2 reading- a King who followed the Lord!! Hezekiah. He removed the high places and ((finally)) tore down the Asherah Poles (the wooden poles to honor Asherah, the fertility goddess).