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4月14日 ........and they crucified Him. Mark 15:25bChrist hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: Galatians 3:13
And it was the third hour, and they crucified him. Mark 15:25
Today Christians around the world call this friday "Good Friday" because as christians we remember that our Lord Jesus Christ made the ultimate sacrifice of Love for us and willingly gave His Life for us. He became our sacrifical lamb for our sins. His blood was shed so that He might redeem back ALL that was His that had been seperated by sin. He paid the ultimate price for the sins of the world. Oh, How can I ever Thank my Lord Enough & show my gratitude for His Love towards me? That although I didn't deserve it, He died for me, a wretched misrable sinner.
One of the many things I didn't like about the film 'The Passion of the Christ' was the over the top use of extreme violence, blood & gore. In the Gospels the writers never went into graphic details of the violence that Jesus Christ suffered at the hands of men. I don't believe God wanted to go into all the gore or it would have been recorded in the gospels. However the prophet Isaish gives a idea how horrific & brutal the death of Christ was when he writes...
I gave my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair: I hid not my face from shame and spitting. Isaiah 50:6.
As many were astonied at thee; his visage was so marred more than any man, and his form more than the sons of men: Isaiah 52:14.
Jesus Christ had his beard pulled from His face. He was beaten so badly that people was appalled by His appearance. He face and body was hardly recognizable as a man. And thats before they crucified Him.
The scriptures give an insight to the brutality & pain suffered by Our Lord. The Passion.. movie seemed to go into it with relish. Ok, I'm going off on a tengent here. What I'm trying to put across very badly it seems is just what Our Lord suffured for US without seeming to be too gorey & glorifying the violence that the movie 'The Passion...." did.
I also looked up what crucify actually means in my Strong's Concordence/lexicon...
GREEK LEXICON -- STRONG'S NUMBER 4717
stauroo {stow-ro'-o}
1) to stake, drive down stakes
2) to fortify with driven stakes, to palisade: a place 3) to crucify 3b) metaph. to crucify the flesh, destroy its power utterly (the nature of the figure implying that the destruction is attended with intense pain) crucifixion was in use among the Egyptians, Gen. 40:19, the Carthaginians, the Persians, Est. 7:10, the Assyrians, Scythians, Indians, Germans, and from the earliest times among the Greeks and Romans. Whether this mode of execution was known among the ancient Jews is a matter of dispute. Probably the Jews borrowed it from the Romans. It was unanimously considered the most horrible form of death. Among the Romans the degradation was also a part of the infliction, and the punishment if applied to freemen was used only in the case of the vilest criminals. The one being crucified was stripped naked of all his clothes, and then followed the most awful moment of all. He was laid down upon the implement of torture. His arms were stretched along the cross beams, and at the centre of the open palms the point of a huge iron nail was placed, which, by the blow of a mallet, was driven home into the wood. Then through either foot separately, or possibly through both together, as they were placed one over the other, another huge nail tore its way through the quivering flesh. Whether the sufferer was also bound to the cross we do not know, but to prevent the hands and feet being torn away by the weight of the body, which could not rest upon anything but four great wounds", there was, about the centre of the cross, a wooden projection strong enough to support at least in part, a human body, which soon became a weight of human agony. Then the "accursed tree" with its living human burden was slowly heaved up and the end firmly fixed in a hole in the ground. The feet were but a little raised above the earth. The victim was in full reach of every hand that might choose to strike. A death by crucifixion seems to have included all that pain and death can have of the horrible and ghastly, -- dizziness, cramp, thirst, starvation, sleeplessness, traumatic fever, tetanus, publicity of shame, long continuance of torment, horror of anticipation, mortification of untended wounds, all intensified just up to the point which they can be endured at all, but stopping just short of the point which would give the sufferer the relief of unconsciousness. The unnatural position made every movement painful; the lacerated veins and crushed tendons throbbed with incessant anguish; the wounds, inflamed by exposure, gradually gangrened; the arteries, especially of the head and the stomach, became swollen and oppressed with surcharged blood; and, while each variety of misery went on gradually increasing, there was added to them the intolerable pang of a burning raging thirst. Such was the death to which Christ was doomed. The crucified was watched, according to custom, by a party of four soldiers, John 19:23, with their centurion, Mat. 27:66, whose express office was to prevent the stealing of the body. This was necessary from the lingering character of the death, which sometimes did not occur even for three days, and was at last the result of gradual benumbing and starvation. But for this guard, the persons might have been taken down and recovered, as was actually done in the case of three friends of Josephus. Only one survived, in spite of the care. Fracture of the legs was especially adopted by the Jews to hasten death. John. 19:31. In most cases the body was suffered to rot on the cross by the action of the sun and rain, or to be devoured by birds and beasts. Burial was generally therefore forbidden; but in consequence of Dt. 21:22,23, an express natural exception was made in favour of the Jews. Mat. 27:58. This form of punishment was abolished by Constantine.
He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted.
But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.
Isaiah 53:3-6
The Old Rugged Cross. On a hill far away stood an old rugged cross, Refrain So I’ll cherish the old rugged cross, O that old rugged cross, so despised by the world, Refrain In that old rugged cross, stained with blood so divine, Refrain To the old rugged cross I will ever be true; Refrain Words & Music:
George Bennard, 1913
12月24日 Happy Christmas!Haven't blogged for a while now for various reasons but I'd make the effort to do a Christmas blog on what is the meaning of christmas?
Before I start my blog though I'd like to wish anyone who happens to read this blog a Very Happy and Blessed Christmas time full of good cheer & health.
This blog is actually inspired by watching a Peanuts cartoon called a Charlie Brown Christmas, in which my hapless hero, Charlie Brown, soul searches why he is so depressed over the christmas season among all the crass comercialism of Christmas. He finds out the real reason for christmas when Linus, so eliquently tells him of the Heavenly Angels proclaiming to the birth our our Savior Lord Jesus Christ in the City of David to shepards watching over thier sheep. Luke 2:8-14 After he hears this his depression lifts & declares to the cynical world that despite it's commercialism hes gonna have a good christmas anyhow his own way.
So... being all inspired I thought I'd blog my thoughts on Christmas... Christmas means 2 things to 2 types of people. Christians & non Christians.
A wordly christmas consists of partys, drunkeness & revelry, total gluttony (which I have to admit I am a lil guilty of at christmas eatin my mums lovely cooked food), hang overs & indegestion, draggin' out that fat fella with a white beard & red n white suit with a silly red hat once again for the season, over spending on presents which make Mr Visa & Mr A. Express rub thier greedy lil hands in glee as they get a nice christmas bonus again this year, the dour look of shoppers faces has they have to join the endless queues in shops, putting up pagan symbols like christmas trees, mistletoe, holly & stuff like that & completly missing the whole point of of christmas is actually is supposed to be about. True they say about peace & good will to all men etc but only for a day? what about the other 364 days, eh?
Christmas to a christian is although recognising that dec. 25th is the birthday of the pagan sun god & knowing that The Lamb of God was actually born in spring in the lambing season.
Christians rejoice & give Thanks to God for giving mankind the best present he could ever wish for. A savior & redeemer. Christians give modest presents as a symbol of that best present ever given to us, christians enjoy fellowship around a nice christmas meal and a time of being with family & friends.
Hard to believe that the 2 kinds of people are actually celebrating the same event, eh!?
Also in closing this blog i'd like to point out that I wasn't actually saying christians shouldn't put up christmas trees & putting christmas presents under them for the kids etc. I was just pointing out that it was actually a pagan thing and nothing to do with the birth of Christ. I'm sure mature christians have a right attitude so such things. I write this because I had written a similar thing on a yahoo group thingy about how much of christmas is actually pagan & that the world replaces Jesus with that santa cluase fella. And that was it right to lie to kids about him being real. Anyways, I got a lil negative feed back to this. So, I wanted to make myself clear on these things 'cos I don't want irrate christians saying there is nothing wrong with sticking up a christmas tree etc!
 "And when along came the virgin born, Divine Son of God, and He was God's provided lamb, provided Sacrifice, Jehovah-jireh, the provided One... And as He was born and the people of that day, of His day, especially the religious people, did not believe Him, because He never come in a classical way that they expected Him. But He came humble, born in a manger, wrapped in swaddling's cloth. There was no singing at His birth, as there is a king's birth. Mortals, when a king is born, the people sing and have jubilee. But there was no king, no people to sing at this King's birth. But the Angels came down and sang to the shepherds, "in the city of David is born Christ the Saviour." " Taken from the message The church of The Living God preached by Bro. William Branham in 1951
"Why was Jesus born in a stable or a manger? Did you ever think of that? He had to be. He was a Lamb. Lambs are not born in houses. Lambs are born in the barns and fields. Abel led his lamb away by a grapevine. Sacrificed him on the altar, and Abel died on the same altar his sacrificed lamb died. And every believer, that comes to Christ, must die on the same altar with his dying Lamb, Christ, and die in Christ to be a new creature: die out to the things of the world and become borned again, a new creature in Christ Jesus. Die on the same altar of self sacrifice. All right." Taken from the message entitled The Resurrection of Lazarus preached by Bro.William Branham. in 1951 "Now, to continue on, I was speaking of when the first noel was sang, was sang by Angels at little Bethlehem. There's where all these great men were born. There's where the promise of the King was born. The promised King came to that. Now, the word... to get quickly now, so I won't hold you too long. The--the promise, the word was this, the word "Bethlehem." Let's break it down. I skipped over a few notes here in order to take up the time. Now, Bethlehem. The word B-e-t-h means "house." E-l means "God," in Hebrew. E-l-h-e-m is "Bread." Bethlehem, "the house of God's Bread." That's what the word means. Words, names, they have meanings. Many people don't believe that, but that's true. If names don't have some meaning, why did Abram's name have to be changed to Abraham? Why did Sarai have to be changed to Sarah? Why did Saul have to be changed to Paul? Why did Simon have to be changed to Peter? See, all these has meanings, everything has meanings. And the name Bethlehem means "the house of God's Bread." Now, how fitting that is to Jesus, the Bread of Eternal Life. Christ is the Bread of Life. We all believe that, don't we? How fitting Bethlehem there, the bread center of the world, was the bread center of Eternal Life. That's why the King had to be born there. He said, in Saint John 6:35, "I am the Bread of Life that come from God out of Heaven. Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and all dead. But this Bread, if a man eats this Bread, he shall live forever." Then, Jesus is the Bread of Life, so the Bread of Life had to come at Bethlehem. He is our Bread of Life for the journey, like Israel. God gave Israel bread out of the skies, for their journey, as they journeyed from where they left Egypt unto the promised land. Bread, nightly, rained down from the skies. And God gave us the Bread of Life for our journey, come at Bethlehem, God's house of Bread. See how it had to be? It must be where that name is called, Bethlehem, "the house of God's Bread." Then how could He be born in Jerusalem? How could He be born in Ramoth-Gilead? See, He come to where His Name was, "house of God's Bread." Taken from the message entitled Why Little Bethleham? preached by Bro.William Branham in 1963
8月14日 Psalm 130 - A Song of DegreesOut of the depths have I cried unto thee, O Lord.
Lord, hear my voice: let thine ears be attentive to the voice of my supplications.
If thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?
But there is forgiveness with thee, that thou mayest be feared.
I wait for the Lord, my soul doth wait, and in his word do I hope.
My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for the morning.
Let Israel (replace Isreal with your name) hope in the Lord for with the Lord there is mercy, and with him is plenteous redemption.
And He shall redeem Israel (replace Isreal with your name again) from all his(/her) iniquities.
Psalm 130:1-8 8月8日 How to Please God.After yesterdays church meeting I have been meditating much on what Bro Samuel preached about how that if we are to be led of the Holy Spirit we 1st must walk in the Spirit. Samuels reading was... For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. Romans 8:13-14.
To Sum up the message, Samuel, preached that only when we live according to The Word and walk in the Spirit having mortified the old man/nature then can God cause us to be Led of His Spirit. I don't really have anything to add any thoughts or comments but just wanted to share some scriptures that I have been reading & meditating on today in the Hope it might Bless someone who happens to read this.
For they that are after the flesh do mind the things of the flesh; but they that are after the Spirit the things of the Spirit. For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead because of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that dwelleth in you. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live after the flesh. For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live. For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. Romans 8:5-16
And they that are Christ's have crucified the flesh with the affections and lusts. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Galatians 5:24-25 But ye have not so learned Christ;If so be that ye have heard him, and have been taught by him, as the truth is in Jesus: That ye put off concerning the former *conversation the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts; And be renewed in the spirit of your mind; And that ye put on the new man, which after God is created in righteousness and true holiness. Ephesians 4:20-24
And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof. Romans 13:11-14
I wasn't going to add anything but I just want to add after talking to a friend that it is only by FAITH that we believe our old natures is dead & that every day we must crucify the flesh anew. As Paul wrote that he dies daily.(1 Corinithians 15:31) So must we & believe. *conversation translates from the greek word anastrophe which means... manner of life, conduct, behaviour
7月20日 Proud to be Peculiar. For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,
Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world;
Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ; Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.
These things speak, and exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee. Titus 2:11-15
But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light: 1 Peter 2:9
Greek Lexicon - Strong's Number 4041
Peculiar - that which is one's own, belonging to one's possessions: a people selected by God from the other nations for his own possession |
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