The Greatest Author: Jesus Christ, so read your bible

📜Hebrews 10:15-17, ESV

The Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying, ‘This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my laws on their hearts, and write them on their minds,’ then he adds, ‘I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.’”

📜 Revelation 3:5

"The one who conquers will be clothed thus in white garments, and I will never blot his name out of the book of life. I will confess his name before my Father and before his angels."

📜 Luke 10:17-20 ESV

The seventy-two returned with joy, saying, “Lord, even the demons are subject to us in your name!” And he said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. Behold, I have given you authority to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall hurt you. Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.”

I rest assured that my name is written in the book of life. There are many books to read but just one should be the priority. What is used to to guide the steps. To light the path.

📜 Psalm 119:105

 "Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path."

Below is an except from "Einstein's Dreams" by Alan Lightman I stumbled upon again. Some would call it coincidence. How fitting that it reflects my past, present and future? I am reminded of what I wrote in 2008 about putting out the book of primary importance.

A world without memory is a world of the present. The past exists only in books, in documents. In order to know himself, each person carries his own Book of Life, which is filled with the history of his life. By reading its pages daily, he can relearn the identity of his parents, whether he was born high or born low, whether he did well or did poorly in school, whether he has accomplished anything in his life. Without his Book of Life, a person is a snapshot, a two dimensional image, a ghost. In the leafy cafes on the Brunngasshalde, one hears anguished shrieking from a man who just read that he once killed another man, sighs from a woman who just discovered she was courted by a prince, sudden boasting from a woman who has learned that she received top honors from her university ten years prior. Some pass the twilight hours at their tables reading from their Books of Life; others frantically fill its extra pages with the day's events.

With time, each person's Book of Life thickens until it cannot be read in its entirety. Then comes a choice. Elderly men and women may read the early pages, to know themselves as youths; or they may read the end, to know themselves in later years.  

Some have stopped reading altogether. They have abandoned the past. They have decided that it matters not if yesterday they were rich or poor, educated or ignorant, proud or humble, in love or empty-hearted - no more than it matters how a soft wind gets into their hair. Such people look you directly in the eye and grip your hand firmly. Such people walk with the limber stride of their youth. Such people have learned how to live in a world without memory.

📜 Ecclesiastes 1:11 ESV

 There is no remembrance of former things, nor will there be any remembrance of later things yet to be among those who come after.

📜 2 Corinthians 6:2 

Behold, now is the favorable time; behold, now is the day of salvation.

Unwrapping the gifts with Michael Miller

Why God Speaks (the whole series is awesome) 

1. To convict of sin and bring people into the faith 

1 Corinthians 14:14,24-25

Feel known by God and a way they hadn't felt known before.

The door to evangelism is open wide

John 4:4-26

Luke 19:1-10

2.  To Build Faith, To Encourage and to Comfort

3. To prepare His body for suffering

Luke 22: 31-24

Act 27:37-30

Soothkeep - Interpretation of Dreams

 

Notes:

God guides our understanding through books, pastors, videos, the right person or word at the right time: working supernaturally. Not coincidences. Illuminations. Any combo of objective and subjective.

Interpretation of dreams must be viewed through a biblical lens and understanding. Don't reject dreams but don't abuse them. Put your dream in the crucible to mitigate the work of the enemy:

Psalm 138:2 NASB2020

[2] I will bow down toward Your holy temple And give thanks to Your name for Your mercy and Your truth; For You have made Your word great according to all Your name

Despise not prophesies or illuminations that connect the dots. I am certainly thankful for God's grace in my learning curve. 

1 Thessalonians 5:19-20 NASB2020

[19] Do not quench the Spirit, [20] do not utterly reject prophecies, 

Dreams are in the same category of other providential directives. He is the mixologist for those who are thirsty.

Direct revelation (we have the completed canon) vs generic illumination (helps us chew on the life circumstance). Not the same thing. Allow yourself to be challenged so you can be nudged in a different direction.

Most dreams are traced to hopes or fears. Strong passions. External stimulus. A mix of information. Spiritual exercise in the night vs direct, providential illumination from the Lord. 

Sniff test: treat all the same. Biblical? Reasonable? Seasonable? Actionable?

What's the difference: more vivid and realistic, speaking to current concerns. The impression, a divine fragrance, is not deminished over time. Typically one message or theme. Content defies natural experience or phenomenon yet they fit perfectly. 

Chewing on the cud; spiritual subconscious springs to the conscious:

Prophetic themed.

Biblical illumination.

Life direction.  

Dream of a quarrel and the stray

Last night's dream from the Teacher:

I was walking past some apartments. An older couple was arguing on their back porch as they entered their home. The woman said a some words and "you're being too sensitive". A reminder of someone I know. I shouted "don't forget about gaslighting and about what you learned in therapy" as I walked past. It was not well received by the couple. Both were upset. I'd overheard them and they didn't like I had said something.

I kept walking with a little dog and found a young thinner short-haired golden colored dog off leash in the median as I crossed the street. The dog was a bit nippy and very excited; hard to get under control. I didn't have a free hand as I was walking a little dog now. A woman came alongside and held the dog and offered to help find its owner. Helped to have another to take the extra dog. Eventually she came back down the street with a leash on the dog. 

📜 Proverbs 26:17 ESV

Whoever meddles in a quarrel not his own is like one who takes a passing dog by the ears.

📜 Ecclesiastes 4:9-10 ESV

 Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another to lift him up!

📜 Luke 15:3-6 ESV 

So he told them this parable: “What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’

An Ant of The Dust Prepares for Winter

The Lord Jesus is not just good or better or best. He is above all things. To say that God is wise is foolish in many regards, for the wisdom of the Creator of the universe is far exceeding any human understanding.  

📜 Colossians 1:15-17 NASB2020

[15]  He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation: [16] for by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, or dominions, or rulers, or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. [17] He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. 

We cannot fathom the expanse of all He is and no words or thought of man can describe His being. All we can describe or say comes from a miniscule and feeble understanding.

 I am no greater than even an ant for it is wiser than me.

📜 Proverbs 6:6-9 NASB20

Go to the ant, you lazy one,

Observe its ways and be wise, 

Which, having no chief,

Officer, or ruler, 

Prepares its food in the summer

And gathers its provision in the harvest. 

How long will you lie down, you lazy one?

When will you arise from your sleep?

While man stands tall it is in the small things of creation that the Teacher reveals great truth from the least: 

📜 Proverbs 30:24-28 NASB20 

Four things are small on the earth,

But they are exceedingly wise:

The ants are not a strong people,

But they prepare their food in the summer; 

The rock hyraxes are not a mighty people,

Yet they make their houses in the rocks; 

The locusts have no king,

Yet all of them go out in ranks; 

The lizard you may grasp with the hands,

Yet it is in kings’ palaces.

Who am I to question? Or to even ask the Father for anything? I am but of dust, which is tampled by the beasts of this earth and washed into the rivers when rain comes and to dust one day I will return. Both the wise and the fool meet the same fate. The penalty for choice of sin. The blight of disobedience.

So as a man of small account I lay my hand on my mouth. (Job 40:4)

My prayer for today is for more time. (though I long to bask in the glory and light of the Father's love!) This is so I may go and tell of the way to overcome.

📜 John 16:33 NASB2020

[33] These things I have spoken to you so that in Me you may have peace. In the world you have tribulation, but take courage; I have overcome the world.”

I take note from the ant: wise to prepare food in the summer in anticipation of the winter trials

So as a soldier in service of my Lord I will commit scripture to my heart, grow faith in my bones, and live in obediance with joyful submission to the King. There is nothing else worth doing under this sun. For I love the Lord my God and Savior of the world.