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September6 @ @ rRandyP comments: mFaithOfJesus kjv@Luke:13:10-17 WHOM SATAN HATH BOUND - Jesus has said that He can only do what He sees the Father do. He sees the Father loosening here. #G630 The word means to send away, divorce, pardon. The woman goes one direction and the infirmity goes the other. The more classical view is that God would be causing infirmity either because she is a sinner or because there is a break down in His genetic codes. If we go back one passage to Jesus' talk regarding catastrophe and mayhem, the context may be that this is what it looks like having a fruitless tree. You will recall in the wilderness for forty years people did not get sick, their clothes did not fray, their shoes even did not wear. When they were in God's complete care infirmity did not appear. As they have removed themselves from God's complete care infirmity abounds more and more. You will recall all the many quotes through the prophets that God has always been willing to heal Israel if they would just keep things straight. Like with the collapse of the towers innocent people may be caught under societies rubble. In fallen societies (from God's view) normal sexual inhibitions lessen, diets change, fears of pain and infirmities and deformities and bad deaths rise and thus odd prescriptions and remedies worsen the situation, medicines and surgeries are mis-prescibed, the entire course of affairs have dire affects upon what was otherwise made to work by God's command. It is an environment dominated by abject fear. Worse yet the door is left wide open for Satan to operate at his will. If God's will is not being followed, whose other will is strong enough? Does this mean that this woman was a devil worshiper? Probably not. Does this mean that she was a sinner? Well we all are. Why are we not all folded over? When so much of God's creation works so well as designed, when it does not these relatively few times (and there is no apparent reason why it shouldn't have) it should be a sign that we have as a society left the door open to another's will. It is not as easy as any one person reaching up and closing that door, it is opened by the whole, it effects the whole, it is closed by the Lord when He sees fit (re-establishes a final closure) for the whole. We also have Israel receiving a double measure sworn from the Lord. God's blessings to us are magnified in them for our observation; so too His curses. Israel was given something Holy to possess: His Commandments, His Covenant, His Name, His Temple, His Seed. Moses warned them of how such blessings would turn to curse should they not fulfill their obligations to that covenant. We today possess a similar (extended) form of that covenant in the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Should we not expect the same double measure or more should we as a group neglect so great a salvation as well? Jesus appears to be walking in an extraordinary time of infirmity and demonic possession. The fruitless tree as a whole is rotted from the core outward. Yet for now, His work was being done on a smaller individual level because that is what He saw the Father as doing. It is not the time yet to remove all sickness because it is not a time yet where we have all come back to HIM. The holiness of His that we hold is yet held by defiled and idle hands. That this miraculous and instantaneous healing was done on Sabbath better states the idleness that prevails week long because of defiled (dead) religious traditions. The faith of our Lord is simply beyond our capacity to understand; our perception of it is too short sighted if not blind. Signs and indications that we should be seeing as messages and proofs are seen rather as God abandoning us. The big picture healing for mankind is not as instantaneous; it has taken several thousand years already to develop. And each one of us (believer and non-believer) are swallowed up in that plan till it comes to full fruition. That it hasn't already is a sign of the size and scope of the problem.

September20 @ @ rRandyP comments: mFaithOfJesus kjv@Luke:17:11-19 SAVE THIS STRANGER - You just have to come to expect it. It happens all of the time even in our own lives. You have mercy on as many as you can and you are likely to see one (if any) of all of them return with a thanks or a nod or a hand shake or something; right. But, it is not really the reason you do any of it. You do it because it is the right thing to do. I can picture the ten men nearby, maybe on a bluff close to the city. Interesting that they would be there all together. I can picture Jesus with everything else that is going on around Him taking notice out of the corner of His eye. The whole moment has as much to say about the crowd as it does the ten men. Jesus had been down these roads before, He had healed a great many in the past; probably in this very spot. How many of those people had come out to the gates to glorify Him? Probably some...but the thousands? It is interesting that He sent these men on before fully healing them as if almost a test as to whether they would turn back. Did Jesus know beforehand which one would come back? He might, but we don't (and we never will). The one's that we would expect never seem to be the ones who do. He does not seem over upset about it; it just seems to be a point that He is making. One in ten... One hundred in a thousand... One thousand in 10k....those would be pretty good numbers if the math holds up. A Savior could probably pull those kind of numbers; not any of us. So what does that tell you about our natures? The faith of our Lord is not in numbers. If prophecy is true the numbers will eventually come. What is important for now is the quality of faith inside those numbers. Finally, for our own mercy's sake, this doesn't necessarily mean that the other nine were not made whole or that they weren't immediately thankful; it only tells us for certain how that they chose to/not to express it.

October11 @ @ rRandyP comments: mFaithOfJesus kjv@Luke:22:39-46 THAT YE ENTER NOT - There was not any hiding or deception. Jesus went to where He always went. Where He knew He would be found. From other accounts we know that He left Himself little defense dividing His disciples eight and three, telling the three to pray. What was the temptation that they were supposed to pray over? Was it the temptation to try and defend Him? Was it the temptation to try and follow Him to His trials? Was it the temptation to try and disguise themselves amongst the crowd where they would be caught in the position of having to deny Him for their own safety? Is this what would open the door to Satan sifting Peter? There are many temptations on the road ahead for these men. Without knowing what one was likely to face how would one go about praying over their temptations? Like the Lord's model prayer one would fill their minds and hearts with the righteousness of God and His kingdom, submit oneself to His will, surrender ones earthly cares asking for His provision and deliverance, offer repentance and seek forgiveness, acknowledge the essential attributes of God, pray this again as the corporate "us". Not everyone did this. Apparently the wrestling over who was the greatest had worn them all out. Jesus is going through something that we cannot explain. We like to focus on His petition, but what we should be focusing on physical agony that He is under even after being supported by an angel. What strength did the angel give? Probably confirmation of the Father's answer to the petition, that this was indeed the Father's will. This extreme pressing of Jesus to the point of blood coming through the pores you will note is happening before Jesus is placed into anyone else's custody. The disciples may be vaguely aware of this sudden change, they are sleeping for sorrow. The temptation may be to hide in sorrowful sleep from what is happening, that it is by the Father's hand, that it is happening before anything other, to be overcome with the developing situation and resort to one's own carnal resources to hold it off. The faith of our Lord steps outside of it's agony for the moment to check on the others and finds them unconscious. He exhorts them once again to pray for themselves.