Why God Created Marriage

Marriage is not something that man came up with.  God designed and instituted marriage in such a way that it would enhance life.  Because of marriage a couple can feel loved and secure in their relationship.  It also represents the relationship between God and man.

In Genesis 1:28 God commands Adam and Eve to go out into the world, be fruitful and multiply. Have children, fill the world with human life.  The fruit of the womb was blessed by God and He wanted them to fill the whole world with children.

A marriage is designed for having children.  Children are designed to be raised by a father and a mother.  Children living in a healthy home with a mother and father are far more likely to attain a happy and fulfilling life.

Marriage was also created as a model of our relationship with God.  A man and a woman are different.  They have different ways of thinking.  Their bodies are designed for different purposes. It is mystery how two so different individuals can not just tolerate each other but flourish with love for each other.  Together they find the part of themselves which was missing before they were married.

Man and God are also different.  It amazes me to think that God could love someone like me, and yet He does.  God created mankind so He could have intimate fellowship with us.  His desire is to bless us completely.  He is there to lead, guide, protect and defend us. Together, God and man, we fulfill a spiritual oneness that nothing else can answer.

This spiritual oneness produces spiritual fruit. There are few things, if any, that God has ever done in this world, since creation, without man's participation. To be spiritually fruitful man requires God. A man and a man, or a woman and a woman, can not be fruitful and have children. Since creation, God has not produced a human life without the aid of a human. It takes both different elements to produce life.

Marriage is for two people to love each other completely and fully, just as God and man are designed to love each other completely and fully.  Both are designed to bear fruit and to fill the world with life both physical and spiritual.

Photo by Ilya Yakover on Unsplash

The Eternal Nation

If God were to place a human, historical witness to His existence, who would that witness be like? To be a historical witness of an eternal God in history, that witness would have to be eternal in some way as well. This witness would also have to stand out in some special way so that people noticed.

That witness is not a person, but a nation.  The Jewish nation is the witness of God's existence.  No other people have survived over 4 millennium and still retain the same religion, the same language, the same monetary unit and live in the same land as they did thousands of years before.  When they disobeyed God, they suffered even to the point of losing their lands, but God is faithful and He brought them back. They are His witness forever.

2 Samuel 7:24 "You have established your people Israel as your very own forever, and you, LORD, have become their God."

You want proof of God?  Look to the Jew.  Winston Churchill wrote "Some people like the Jews, and some do not.  But no thoughtful man can deny the fact that they are, beyond all question, the most formidable and the most remarkable race which has ever appeared in the world."

The next time you meet someone Jewish, thank them for showing you that God does exist.  That person has the thumbprint of God on their life.

Photo Credit: fingerprint by Jose Luis Agapito

The Mysterious Portal

There is a portal to a different realm which people can pass through and enter into a new existence.  A place to live a new life in a new reality.  Perhaps it is a trans-dimensional portal or simply a doorway into a new Universe.  I don't know how it works, but I do know that it exists.

God set up a foreshadowing of this portal back at the first Passover.  The Children of Abraham killed a lamb and marked the door way to their house with the lamb's blood.  Blood was placed to the right and left sides of the doorway, and then some was wiped upon the top of the door frame.  When the Angel of Death saw the blood dripping from the doorway, he passed over that house and didn't kill the first born.

If people were outside of that house they were in danger of death, but if they entered that doorway of blood, they would be safe inside.  The next time they left through that blood soaked doorway, it was to freedom. Moses took all the people on to a promised land which they had never seen before.  It was a land of milk and honey.

The true portal, which the Passover foreshadowed, was built around 30 AD.  It too was soaked with the blood of the sacrificial lamb.  Everyone who entered this portal would be safe from eternal death. This portal also was the doorway to a new realm, a new kingdom flowing with the milk and honey of God's blessings.

That portal is in the shape of a cross.  It doesn't look like a doorway to walk through, but in reality it is.  This is a doorway that you must walk through spiritually.  You must pass through the blood in order to walk into the safety of God and on to the Promised Land of Heaven.

Photo Credit: door by Michal

Where is the Holiest Place on Earth?

Where was the holiest place on Earth? Jerusalem is the Holy City and in Jerusalem stood the temple where God's presence could be found.  In that temple was a room called the Kodesh Hakodashim which means Holy of Holies.  That one small room was the holiest place on earth.

Once a year, at Yom Kippur, one man would enter that most holiest of places to sprinkle the blood of the sacrificial lamb on the Mercy Seat.  When he was in this room, no one witnessed anything that was done or said. This was a secret room where only one man came into the presence of God.

The Temple was destroyed in 70 AD, so where is that secret place now?  What is the holiest place on Earth since the Holy of Holies no longer exist?  It can be found where ever you put it.

God desires to meet with you one on one.  Just one person meeting in secret with God.  The best part is that He no longer wants this as a once a year event, but everyday.  What room do you have where you meet with God totally separated from the world?  Where is that secret place where only you and God meet together to commune and share each others hearts.  A place of intimacy and safety to share all secrets with each other.  This is where God will share His thoughts with you.  This one secret place is where you will hear His voice and see His glory.  This is where God reveals Himself to you and where you will find only love as you reveal yourself to Him. 

Where you meet with God, that room is the holiest place on earth.
 
Photo Credit: Temple Mount (Jerusalem model)_1357 by James Emery

My Pet Peeve: "It's an Act of God"

We all have our own particular pet peeves.  One that makes me cringe is when I hear someone call a tragedy an "Act of God".  To them an act of God is when a hurricane or tornado destroys cities, homes and takes lives.  When a tree falls on a house, it is an act of God.  If lightning strikes a person, it is an act of God.  It seems that whenever anything terrible happens, and we can not point a finger at some person, it is an act of God.

If I was a man who swore, this is where I would give you my boldest, loudest, most damning expletive. NO! NO! NO!  Every death, sickness, and tragedy is a result of man.  Yes, even the weather such as hurricanes is a result of man.

When God created this world for us, it was a perfect paradise.  There was no sickness.  There were no storms, earthquakes or tornadoes.  In fact there wasn't even any decay or death.  Man lived a perfect, peaceful life until he rebelled against God.  That rebellion caused death, sickness and pain to come into this world.  Man lost a part of himself which was pure and perfect and he could no long pass that down to his children.  And so mankind was cursed to live the sin burdened lives we have now in this world.

After Adam and Eve were cast out of the Garden of Eden, their descendants grew in number and also in rebellion against God.  The people became so corrupt that God had to save Noah and his family before even they were corrupted into a life full of sin.  So God destroyed all flesh and in doing so He changed the weather and the lands to where they are now unstable.  Earthquakes and storms are now found all around the world as a result of man's rebellion.

You want to know what an act of God really is?  Cancer is a result of man's sin, but there are people walking around today that God has healed.  People who were to die in weeks or months are alive and well after many years because of God.

God has brought marriages back together.  He has comforted those who have experienced loss.  If someone dies we say, "God took him."  No.  Sin took that person from us but, if they knew Jesus as Savior, God carried them home to Him.

Acts of God are acts of love, not tragedy.

Why Would a Loving God Kill a Whole Nation?

Most people can not understand why God, who the Bible says is love, would command a nation of people to be killed.  Not just the soldiers, but every man, woman and child was to be put to death.  It seems counter to what any caring and loving person would do.

In 1 Samuel 15 God orders Saul to kill all the Amalekites.  Every man, woman, child and baby was to die. Even the animals were to be put to death.  Saul disobeyed God. You might think that Saul was more loving than God was, but that is not true.  God had ordered the death of the Amalekites because of His love for Israel.

God did love the Amalekites, but He also knew their hearts and what the future held if they were to live.  God looks not only at what is happening now, but also what the results of today's actions will bring tomorrow.

Because of Saul's disobedience to kill every Amalekite, the people of Israel suffered.  A wicked man named Haman devised a plot to kill all the Jews in the Persian Empire.  Haman was an Amalekite. He didn't succeed because God used Queen Esther and her uncle Mordecai to stop Haman's plot.

God is the Great Physician not only of our bodies but of our lives.  When a Doctor finds a cancer it must be removed before it affects the rest of the body.  The Amalekites had a heart that was godless and dark.  Israel tried to befriend them, but their hatred for Israel brought them to war against Israel. God knew that this Amalekite cancer would only get worse.  Just as a Doctor would never want to remove an arm from a patient, God did not want to kill all the Amalekites.  But just as a Doctor does remove a cancerous arm before the cancer spreads and kills the patient; God ordered the Amalekites removed.

God never wants to cause pain in the world or in our lives, but because He knows what the future holds in this world, He does bring pain in order to save us.  We can not judge what God does because we can not see what He sees.  We can only trust Him and His love for us that it will all works out for good. 

What Does Amen Mean?

The Hebrew word for faith is Emunah.  The root of this word is Emun which means truth, solid, sure, support.  Faith is a surety of what is not seen being true and solid.  Emunah also means steadfast, established, and stable.  The more faith you have, the more established and stable the object of your faith becomes in your life.   When you have faith in God, He becomes stronger and more established in your life.

Another word that comes from the same root word is amen.  It sounds like emun or emunah.  To say amen is to say "That is true."  "Yes, I have faith in that."  Faith is to say amen to God. It is to say amen to God's salvation. Amen to His love. Amen to the reality of God.

Saying Amen is to say, "My whole being, my heart and my soul stand steadfast in the knowledge that what God says is true.  I stand on His word which is a solid rock that shall never fail me.  Here I stand, I can not do otherwise."