Thinking about God, Jesus and The Big Questions

The people of Israel were asking for a king. God gave them the type of leader they wanted, which was King Saul. God warned the people about asking for such a king. The prophet Samuel was communicating to the people and to God: Then all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah, and said to him, “You are old and your sons do not follow in your ways; appoint for us, then, a king to govern us, like other nations.” But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to govern us.” Samuel prayed to the Lord, and the Lord said to Samuel, “Listen to the voice of the people in all that they say to you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me from being king over them. Just as they have done to me, from the day I brought them up out of Egypt to this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so also they are doing to you.  Samuel 8: 4-8 God warned the Israelites through Samuel that they would soon be in despair under the rule of this kin...

The End of Days has been covered in quite a lot of detail in the Bible. It is clear that there will be economic suffering in addition to oppressive leadership . There will also be a lot of physical suffering . I heard what sounded like a voice coming from among the four living creatures, which said, "A kilo of wheat for a day's wages, and three kilos of barley for a day's wages.  But do not damage the olive trees and the vineyards!" Revelation 6:6 The Bible verse above indicates an extremely expensive price for food. Could this occur via a route of climate change and/or ecological disaster? The answer is yes it's possible, but alternative routes are also possible. The Bible spells out the results of the end of days, but not the exact route it will happen. So we cannot know for sure the exact path it will take. As I have mentioned before, the Bible tells us THAT something will happen, but not HOW or WHEN . An illustration of a prophecy coming to pass is durin...

Human leaders are just as fallible as we ourselves are. We should not place our hope in human leaders. Instead we should place our hope and trust in God. God is so much better in all ways than any human leader. This passage of Psalms expresses this very clearly: Do not put your trust in princes, in mortals, in whom there is no help. When their breath departs, they return to the earth; on that very day their plans perish.  Happy are those whose help is the God of Jacob, whose hope is in the Lord their God Psalms 146: 3-5 If you found this post interesting, you might also like these related posts on this blog: We should never swear anything on the Bible, even in a court of law Our leaders are imperfect. Even the best leader pales in comparison to Jesus. How to know the difference between God's plan and foolhardiness? God is not a crazy stalker. He will not inflict himself upon us. He lets us choose

I have heard many times before that Christians are ambassadors for God's kingdom. But I'd never stopped to really think what that meant until recently. To put it into perspective, imagine you are the ambassador for an earthly country. That's an incredibly important job. In that situation, you would be charged with responsibilities that had very far-reaching ramifications. As much as we look up to earthly ambassadors, should we not then attach even more importance to the job of being ambassador to the creator of the Universe, the King of Heaven? We are very fortunate to know God and Jesus, and we are also fortunate to be their ambassadors here on Earth. We should be honored to be tasked with that role. Yet how many of us take our responsibilities less seriously than what they would if they had a job as an ambassador to an earthly country? I know I'm guilty of that. And our job as ambassadors for God's kingdom is even more important than that to an earthly count...

I've talked before about what the Bible says about the Mark of the Beast and you can recap that here . Up until now, there wasn't an implanted technology in everyday use that was actually being utilized to make payments as described in Revelation 13. This has recently changed. NPR reported that a U.S. company has offered to implant chips in the hands of their employees (see reference 1). These chips allow them to make cafeteria-style payments. In other words, a chip inside their hand will be used to identify the employee and to deduct funds from their cafeteria account when making purchases. It is an opt-in program, so the employees are not being compelled to do it. Let's take a look at what the Bible says about the Mark of the Beast: Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, so that no one can buy or sell who does not have the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number o...

Every election year, I notice that many people get very vocal for or against a particular candidate. But   we should never put all of our trust in human leaders . Even the best human leader is flawed and imperfect. Even the best candidate of the century pales in comparison to Jesus. It's good to carry out our civic responsibilities: carefully considering the candidates and their policies, and picking which one we feel is best for the country at the time.  It is wonderful to live in a democracy where we have choices. At the same time, I find it hard to get passionately behind any candidate, because I have yet to find one that isn't flawed. I'm flawed too, an imperfect being, a sinner. We all are. It's part of being human. But just as I would not find myself worthy of leading a country, I find it hard to find anyone worthy of leading the country. In the second coming of Christ, we can look forward to a new Heaven and a new Earth, with God and Jesus as our leaders. Now...

After having read the Bible, it became clear that humans are so, well... human! We are all sinners.  This is why I am constantly surprised at people who give the appearance of believing that the political party they follow has all the correct policies and a spotless character, while the opposition is evil and corrupt and must be avoided at all costs - this point of view is almost hilarious in a modern-day democracy! After reading the Bible, I had even less understanding of how anyone could hold this point of view.  I suspect that all the political parties in most modern democracies are somewhere between spotless and pure evil.... like us humans! I find it virtually impossible to get passionate about any human leader.  Why? They are imperfect beings, like me.  Of course, it's important to take our civic responsibilities seriously such as voting in elections.  But after making what you believe is the best decision for your country, ...