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For I know the plans I have for you,declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jer 29:11 |
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| Archived Manna: | |
Dear
Friend,
If you do not already have a habit of gathering daily manna the first thing in the morning (we can look at the example given to us in Exodus 16 and find the pattern for make it a habit. Establish your life and your schedule to allow you the necessary time to do your daily collection first thing every morning to give you the strength to make it through the day. And remember that today’s manna will not be sufficient for tomorrow; tomorrow’s manna must be collected tomorrow morning. Tuesday, December 4, 2018
Today's Passage : Today's Passage:O Jerusalem Bible Verse:Matthew 23:37-39 "“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it! How often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you were not willing! See, your house is left to you desolate. For I tell you, you will not see me again, until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’” Matthew 24:1-2 (ESV) Jesus left the temple and was going away, when his disciples came to point out to him the buildings of the temple. But he answered them, “You see all these, do you not? Truly, I say to you, there will not be left here one stone upon another that will not be thrown down.” " Message:
Although it may seem odd to look at one of the last chapters of Matthew during Advent, it is important to understand fully the “why” of Christ’s birth in terms of the old covenant with the Jews, the covenant of Moses. So let us jump forward to the time just before the crucifixion.
In the section just before today’s passage, Matthew 23:29-36, Christ condemned the Pharisees, holding them guilty for the murder of God’s prophets centuries before, calling them “snakes and vipers,” and asking how they expect to escape hell. Their covenant with God has failed. It has ended with God’s judgment of them for their sins.
Yet we know that “God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.” (John 3:17) Despite the Jews’ horrific sinfulness, Christ cannot help but let His love for them show. He does not want anyone to go to hell for their sins, even the worst of sinners: the Pharisees and their colleagues, who had spilled the blood of the prophets, who had killed God’s very messengers and would soon kill Christ himself.
Monkeys battling snails from Illuminated Hymnal
The metaphor of a hen gathering chicks under her wings is first seen in the writings of Ezra, in 2 Esdras 1:30-33: “I gathered you as a hen gathers her brood under her wings. But now, what shall I do to you? I will cast you out from my presence. . . . I sent to you my servants the prophets, but you have taken and slain them . . . . Your house is desolate.”
The underlying message in this teaching is that the covenant with the Jews is fulfilled and replaced by God’s final covenant with humanity, the covenant of forgiveness in Christ. Indeed, Christ seems to be speaking as God the Father in the first paragraph, for He is announcing that physical Jerusalem (what Paul calls “Jerusalem . . . in slavery”) will no longer be a holy city. Jerusalem will be left to the Pharisees desolate; God will be gone from it. (And, in fact, the Temple building will be physically destroyed by the Romans 35 years later, never to rise again.) Mighty Jerusalem fails them; they (and we) are saved by humble Bethlehem.
Christ follows “your house is left to you desolate” with the words for “you will not see me again until . . . .” This can only mean one thing. He is the new Temple. God's “temple,” the place where the salvation of humanity dwells, has relocated from a building in Jerusalem to the body of Jesus Christ. Both of them will be “torn down,” but Christ's body will rise again. And the Jews — like everyone else — will not see the Temple again until Christ's second coming.
Meditation : Prayer : Now unto him that is able to keep me from falling, and to present me faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God our Savior, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever.......Amen |
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