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Wednesday, May 19, 2010

An Excellent Prayer in Trying Times

I read 2 Chronicles 20 and Matthew Henry's commentary on the chapter for my devotion this morning. I've been reading one chapter of the Bible, beginning with the 1st chapter of the 1st book in the Bible (Genesis), and Matthew Henry's corresponding commentary (from Numbers onwards) almost daily since 2008. This was a discipline and aspiration that I had set for myself ever since visiting my friend in Shanghai in Mar 2008 and being impressed by her deep knowledge and application of Scripture.

Back to 2 Chron 20. I was struck this morning by the verses which I had underlined in previous readings - v12 "We do not know what to do, but our eyes are upon you." and v15 "For the battle is not yours, but God's." The context was King Jehoshaphat's prayer to God when faced with an invasion by a vast army of Moabites, Ammonites and Edomites.

How often have I been in trying times and do not know what to do. Even as an 18-year-old Christian (huh, 18 years old? 18 years as Christian lah!), there are times when I do not know how to pray, what to pray for; there are just no words that I could utter even in my heart or with my mind. Tears sometimes take the place of words that are not there. I take heart in the words of the Apostle Paul in Romans :

"26 ... the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will."

I've shared with my former boss about the dilemma that I sometimes have in praying - pray for this no good, pray for that also no good. Her advice to me? Pray for God's will be done.

Looking at King Jehoshaphat's prayer in 2 Chron 20, we also have a model that we can emulate. Matthew Henry calls Jehoshaphat's prayer "an excellent prayer". In this prayer, Matthew Henry sees Jehoshaphat:

1) Acknowledging the sovereign dominion of God, giving to God the glory of it and taking to himself the comfort of it.
v6 "O LORD, God of our fathers, are you not the God who is in heaven? You rule over all the kingdoms of the nations. Power and might are in your hand, and no one can withstand you. "

2) Laying hold on their covenant-relation to God and interest in him. Whom should we seek to, whom should we trust to, for relief, but to the God we have chosen and served?
v7 "O our God, did you not drive out the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel and give it forever to the descendants of Abraham your friend?"

3) Showing the title they had to the good land they were now in possession of. We are tenants, you are our landlord - will you not hold your own? Those that use what they have for God may comfortably hope that he will secure it to them.
v7 "O our God, did you not drive out the inhabitants of this land before your people Israel and give it forever to the descendants of Abraham your friend?"

4) Making mention of the sanctuary, the temple they had built for God's name, not as if that merited anything at God's hand, but it was such a token of God's favourable presence with them.
v8-9 "They have lived in it and have built in it a sanctuary for your Name, saying, 'If calamity comes upon us, whether the sword of judgment, or plague or famine, we will stand in your presence before this temple that bears your Name and will cry out to you in our distress, and you will hear us and save us.' "

5) Pleading the ingratitude and injustice of his enemies. We may comfortably appeal to God against those that render us evil for good. The justice of God is the refuge of those that are wronged.
v10-11 "But now here are men from Ammon, Moab and Mount Seir, whose territory you would not allow Israel to invade when they came from Egypt; so they turned away from them and did not destroy them. See how they are repaying us by coming to drive us out of the possession you gave us as an inheritance. "

6) Professing his entire dependence upon God for deliverance.
v12 "O our God, will you not judge them? For we have no power to face this vast army that is attacking us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are upon you. "

The battle, then, is the Lord's.

Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Bread Rained Down From Heaven

S and KH had promised to bake their humongus bread for us in Wuhan. Warm, crispy, freshly baked french loaf for breakfast ..... also banana-walnut bread, white milk bread, pancakes ..... spread with home-made strawberry jam and kumquat jam, air-flown yakun kaya ..... washed down with a cup of aromatic starbucks or ipoh white coffee ..... How well they feted us!

Our Wuhan experience spurred each of us (K, LL and I) to try our hands (or rather the bread-making machine in the case of LL) at bread-baking back home. LL's french loaf tasted so good with her chicken curry. K's 'no-knead' bread looks so good, but alas, can only feast with my eyes.

Still, nothing is better-tasting than the bread that is "rained down from heaven", that tastes like "wafers made with honey" - bread that is not made by hand or machine but a gift from God, the Creator of all things. The Israelites called this bread from heaven "manna". God provided manna to the Israelites every day for forty years. (Ex 16:1-35)

Based on the first census taken two years after the exodus from Eygpt, there were 603,550 male Israelites 20 years or more (excluding the Levites) who were able to serve in Israel's army (Num 1:45). From this count of military strength, estimates put the total Israelite population at 2 to 3 million (http://www.keyway.ca/htm2001/20010121.htm). It would take a miracle to feed such a huge population in the desert where food is scarce, and to feed them every day for forty years! Only the Almighty God could perform this miracle and He did!

"Manna", the bread from heaven, can satisfy the physical need of the Israelites only one day at a time; none can keep the manna till the next morning (Ex16:19-20). There is another bread from heaven - the living bread that satisfies our eternal, spiritual need. Jesus is this living bread. The Bible teaches that "man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord" (Deu 8:3, Matt 4:4). We need the spiritual nourishment that only Jesus can give.

"Then Jesus declared, 'I am the bread of life, He who comes to me will never go hungry and he who believes in me will never be thirsty .' " (John 6:35)

"48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your forefathers ate the manna in the desert, yet they died. 50 But here is the bread that comes down from heaven, which a man may eat and not die. 51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world." (John 6:48-51)

Jesus is much more than the Bread of life. He is in every facet of our life. Dr Willmington writes:

To the baker, he is the Bread of life (John 6:35)
To the artist, he is the One altogether lovely (Song of songs 5:16)
To the architect, he is the chief Cornerstone (1 Pet 2:6)
To the astronomer, he is the Sun of righteousness (Mal 4:2)
To the banker, he is the hidden treasure (Matt 13:44)
To the builder, he is the sure foundation (Isa 28:16)
To the carpenter, he is the door (John 10:7)
To the doctor, he is the great Physician (Jer 8:22)
To the educator, he is the new and living way (Heb 10:20)
To the farmer, he is the sower and the Lord of the harvest (Luke 10:2)
(Source: Willmington's Guide to the Bible)

Who is Jesus to me? He is my everything.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Bread First?

We were gathered at Expo Hall 6 waiting for the English Presbytery Easter Convention to begin. And I was urging LL to hand me her home-made pineapple-mango jam. "Shouldn't we wait till the service is over?" K mused at my side. "It's ok," I said defensively to her. "Read 1 Kings 19," I added.

Was I being irreverent to think of physical food while waiting to receive spiritual nourishment? Looking back, I should have quietened my heart to focus on the Lord Jesus, whose death and resurrection we were commemorating at the Easter Convention.

Indeed, we should quieten our hearts before any worship service. At Bethel's Mandarin service that I attend from time to time on Sunday, the choir always sings the same opening song - that in the holy temple of God, there should be quietness (在神的圣殿中, 应当肃静.)

Why, then, did I ask K to read 1 Kings 19? At the back of my mind were two incidents in which I was taught that physical food came before spiritual food - a Christian counselling course which I attended at the Singapore Bible College and the advice of my former church elder (who's a GP) concerning my mother.

During my Christian counselling course, the example of Elijah in 1 Kings 19 was cited to show that there were times when physical healing had to come before emotional, mental or spiritual healing. After his Mount Carmel victory over the false prophets, Elijah fled from Queen Jezebel who threatened to kill him. In his exhaustion, he slept and was then fed by an angel of God with bread and water. And strengthened by this food, Elijah traveled 40 days and 40 nights until he reached Horeb, the mountain of God. There, the Lord appeared to Elijah and instructed him.

What about my mother then? She became a Christian shortly after being diagnosed with terminal cancer. For a very short while, I tried my best to tell her simple stories from the Bible in my broken hokkien. When I shared with my church elder concerning my mother's lack of knowledge of the Bible and inability to go to church (she was already bedridden when she accepted Christ), he advised - take care of the physical body first, don't worry about the spiritual life.

I have come to understand that our Lord God is gracious and compassionate. He looks at our hearts, regardless of how much we know in our head or what we do in our body. At one time, my sis said to me that she needed to read and understand the Bible first before she could become a Christian. Thanks be to God that He does not require this of my sis (or any one) for her salvation. Becoming a Christian is very simple - just call on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ:

"9 ... if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. 11 As the Scripture says, "Anyone who trusts in him will never be put to shame." 12 For there is no difference between Jew and Gentile--the same Lord is Lord of all and richly blesses all who call on him, 13 for, "Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved." " (Rom 10:9-13)

Salvation is by faith alone (sola fide), in Christ alone (solus Christus), through grace alone (sola gratia), rooted and grounded in scripture alone (sola scriptura) and for God's glory alone (soli deo gloria).

Monday, May 3, 2010

"I AM WHO I AM."

"That's irreverent," I told my friend when he proudly showed me his son's website. Most personal websites would use such caption as "About Myself" for their personal profiles. My friend's son used the caption "I Am" for his web profile. "I Am"? Didn't he know that this was the name that God called Himself in the Bible? Yes, he did know (being a Roman Catholic).

So is using the title "I Am" for oneself an issue?

In biblical terms, "I AM" speaks of the Deity. To knowingly use the title "I AM" for oneself is to seek to raise oneself to God's level, to be like God. This manifestation of pride is the cause of the downfall of both angels and Man in times past.

"13 You said in your heart, "I will ascend to heaven; I will raise my throne above the stars of God; I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly, on the utmost heights of the sacred mountain. 14 I will ascend above the tops of the clouds; I will make myself like the Most High." 15 But you are brought down to the grave, to the depths of the pit. " (Isa 14:13-15)

In the Old Testament, God clearly said to Moses at the burning bush that His name was "I AM".

"13 Moses said to God, "Suppose I go to the Israelites and say to them, 'The God of your fathers has sent me to you,' and they ask me, 'What is his name?' Then what shall I tell them?" 14 God said to Moses, "I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: 'I AM has sent me to you.' " 15 God also said to Moses, "Say to the Israelites, 'The Lord, the God of your fathers--the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob--has sent me to you.' This is my name forever, the name by which I am to be remembered from generation to generation. " (Ex 3:13-15)

And when God gave the ten commandments to Moses at the "burning" mountain (Mount Sinai), the third commandment was:

"You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God, for the LORD will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name. " (Ex 20:7)

That "I AM" is God's name is also evident in the New Testament. Jesus calls himself "I AM" seven times in the Gospel according to the Apostle John:

I am the Bread of life (John 6:35, 41, 48, 51).
I am the Light of the world (John 8:12, 9:5).
I am the Good Shepherd (John 10:11, 14).
I am the Door (John 10:7, 9).
I am the Resurrection and the Life (John 11:25).
I am the true Vine (John 15:1, 5).
I am the Way and the Truth and the Life (John 14:6).

Jesus has given us His assurance that He is with us - to feed and fill us with His truth, to protect and give us life, to shine and lead the way - not only today but in the resurrected life to come.

Emmanuel - God with us!