A living sacrifice

This early morning as I was in prayer the Lord reminded me of a scripture verse from Romans 12. Verse 1 says "I beseech you therefore, brethren , that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service." That is only my reasonable service. And in verse 2 he tells us "And be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God." Just being a nonconformist is not the answer...the hippies were nonconformists, the beatniks were nonconformists...remember them? So what is the writer to the Romans saying?
One thing he is saying as you read on in this chapter 12 is that we are members of His body and as such we ought to live in humble submission to what God wants from us...we should not live and even think like we are superior to others, not to think more highly of ourselves than we ought to think, we need to think soberly and God has given us faith to do just that. In 1 Corinthians ch. 13 commonly known as the "love" chapter it says that love is not puffed up. Love does not parade itself. It does not always dominate every conversation, it does not always want the spotlight, it does not always want to be the center piece in every picture. It isn't rude, it does not want it's own way; the list goes on...read that 13th. chapter and read it over again and again.Don't make a fool of yourself by being obnoxious, if you catch my drift. Love loves life, especially life in Christ. Once I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things." Grow up is what the Bible is saying..some people never do. Jesus says "take up your cross and follow Me. Don't be a showoff.
The hymn writer said it like this, "my heart is thrilled when'er I think of Jesus, the only name that sets the captive free, the only name through which I find salvation, no other name has meant so much to me"...that is how I feel.

People

People are important...to God, so much so that He sent His only begotten Son to this earth to be born of a virgin, to suffer at the hands of one of the cruelest regimes planet earth has ever experienced, betrayed by His own countrymen,His own friends, even His own family. The Bible says they were offended because of Him. And then they nailed Him to a cross....what untold agony that must have been. People are important to those whom we joined in Morocco who went there(there were five of us) for the sole purpose of encouraging some heroes of the faith. For them to know that we journeyed all the way from Canada just to shake their hand or give them a hug and let them know that we loved them was a real blessing to them. They treated us like the king and his queen. These dear people made sacrifices just to be in our company and it could have been probably not so pleasant for them if some knew what we were talking about. But they sacrificed to feed us, no doubt in my mind and we in turn are in their debt. These are precious people. They are so very important to us.
People are important to each other and we will gather on the morrow to worship our God, but undoudedly we are glad and happy to see one another. Handshakes, back slapping, hugs...all saying to that other person, "you are important to me. When you are in an atmosphere like we will be in tomorrow, fellowshipping with people of like precious faith, nothing else can compare. It is a great blessing for me to gather with the saints of God and offer praise to Him. People are important to our friend Naida who is in Mali with Madeliene and some other people ministering the love of God through medicine. You who are reading this are important to me also and I hope that you will let me know if this blog or any other blog that I or Naida may do is important to you...RC

Disparity
Disparity means by definition the condition or fact of being unequal. While Judy and I were travelling in a particular country in North Africa recently, we discovered what that word really means. We saw just how unequal this world can be. We live in Canada, the best country in the world in our opinion and rather than gloat about it as some nations do, we are grateful to be Canadians.....we were born and raised here. Canada is the second largest country in size in the world, second only to Russia. With only 33.5 million people or so, we have a lot of space left. The particular country that we were travelling in has approximately the same population figures as does Canada in fact we are 36 and they are 37th in the world as far as population goes, but in land massCanada is #2 and the country we visited is #57 in size. We have almost 10 million square kilometres; the country in question has only 446,550 square km's which makes our country over 22 times larger. Now that is disparity. Canada is rich in natural resources as well and compared to other countries we are rich beyond measure. But the real disparity between our two countries is not so much a physical thing but it is rather a spiritual situation...you cannot preach the gospel of Jesus Christ in that land. Christians, you had better be thankful and diligent concerning our freedom and we had best take advantage of every opportunity that we have to proclaim the good news...it might not always be this way. In contrast to the laws of that totally Islamic nation however, they are free to practice their religion in my country. They can pray anywhere they want to without fear of arrest or harassment of any kind. Again an example of disparity. An example from the Bible comes to mind and while I will not take time to quote the scripture verses, it is the story or parable if you will concerning the ten virgins...five of them were wise and five were foolish. The five wise had kept themselves prepared for the coming arrival of their heavenly bridegroom but the foolish ones had not. Take notice that they were all virgins which speaks of purity, however the foolish ones were not prepared...they had let their lamps run out of oil. Are we in tune with our heavenly bridegroom? Are we in a constant attitude of prayer? Jesus said "men ought always to pray and noy faint. Perhaps we too need someone to talk to about spiritual things, perhaps we need to increase our time spent with our bridegroom so that when the cry comes "go ye out to meet Him...there will not be any disparity.

colors of tthe veil, cont'd.

The third color of the veil is scarlet.....perhaps the most significant of all the colors in the veil. Scarlet or red represents the purpose of this entire gospel story; it represents the shed blood of the Lamb of Calvary. "Behold the Lamb of God who taketh away the sins of the world.
Hebrews says "How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?"
Heb. 9-14. 1 Peter 1:18,19...For as much as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things such as silver or gold, from your vain conversations received by tradition from your fathers; but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a Lamb without blemish and without spot:"
The scarlet on the veil speaks to you and I tonight of the blood that Jesus shed for each and every man, woman, boy or girl on the face of planet earth. He was faithful to death and are we not required to do the same if necessary?
One more color though it may not be spelled out in these verses, is the color of white...someone has said that white is the presence of all colors and that black is the absence of colors..I don't know if that is true or not but it does fit if it is true. In it's description of the veil the Bible speaks of fine twined linen. It is depicted in Revelation as the righteousness of the saints. It speaks of purity. If we are going to be part of the bride then we must have purity...we must be pure and the blood of Jesus is the only thing that will keep us pure and make us pure. Our thought life must be pure...our conversation must be pure...what we say..when you say Oh my God..are you using His name in vane or are you praying? Are we honest in all our business dealings with others? You know the devil is an accuser but there are times when it is the Word of God that accuses us. White is a color in the veil.
Oh! the blood that drew salvation's plan, oh! the grace that brought it down to man, Oh the might gulf that God did span...at Calvary.

If you've been with Jesus, it will show on your face

Ex. 34:29-35 : "Moses came down from Mount Sinai. As he came down from the mountain with the two tablets in his hand, Moses did not know tht the skin of his face shone because he had been talking with God. When Aaron and all the Israelites saw Moses, the skin of his face was shining, and they were afraid to come near Him. But Moses called to them; and Aaron and all the leaders of the congregation returned to him and Moses spoke with them. Afterward all the Israelites came near, and he gave them in commandment all that the LORD had spoken with him on Mount Sinai. When Moses had finished speaking with them, he put a veil on his face, but whenever Moses went in before the LORD to speak with Him, he would take the veil off, until he came out; and when he came out, and told the Israelites what he had been commanded, that the Israelites would see the face of Moses, that the skin of his face was shining; and Moses would put the veil on his face again , until he went in to speak with Him."Have you ever noticed that some people's facial expression, who claim to be a Christian seem to have a facial expression of a prune? How can this be? Having been in the presence of the LORD many times and praying with those of like mindedness, I have seen what the results of that experience can be. A person who loves Jesus ought to show it on their face; it should be evident by their countenance.





We have just been with some great Christian people. Most of them are Spanish and since most of them can't speak English and we can't "habla Espaniol" it would seem like we could not communicate, however such is not the case, we communicate because of the abidng presence of Almighty God, who Jesus is, and it shows on our faces. The glory of God will show forth on the faces of those who love to be in His presence.




Even a smile will bring forth another smile but this that is spoken of Moses is much greater than a smile, it is a reflection of Jesus face. Our lives should be like that shining for Jesus. When we've been with Jesus, spending time in His presence, our lives should shine with a radiance that is .from God. You don't even have to say anything, all you have to do is shine for Him. The face of Moses shone because he had just spent forty days with Him on the mount Sinai studying the Word of God. God was giving to Moses His Word. It was alive and it was powerful. Moses was there in His presence, face to face with the creator of the universe. The book of Hebrews is very clear on just who created the universe as is the gospel of John. In ch. 1 and verse 1&2 of John we read,"In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him and without Him ws not anything made that was made." Also in Hebrews ch. 1 explains that through the Son, He(God) created the worlds...the universe and later in the same chapter verse 10 it says, "And, In the beginning, LORD, You founded the earth, and the heavens are the workof your hands." John saw this creator when he was on the Isle of Patmos and he said in verse17, "When I saw Him, I fell at His fet as though dead." Little wonder he did; he was in the very presence of the living God! Every eye is going to see Him...