Sermon from August 23, 2009
12th Sunday after Pentecost
Based on Scripture: Isaiah 29:16
Introduction
There are some things in life where being upside down isn’t a bad thing.
About two years ago people were all excited about growing tomatoes upside down. You could buy an upside down tomato planter for $19.99. An upside down tomato plant had advantages.
When I was growing up, at just about every pot luck, someone made an upside down pineapple cake which was a big favorite. There was nothing wrong with that kind of upside down pastry.
But most of the time being turned upside down is not a good thing.
Having an upside down mortgage -- not ok.
Having the company you work for go upside down because of hard economic times --extremely stressful.
Having a relationship such as a friendship or a marriage go upside down -- devastating.
There are some upside down situations though that are beyond our control such the economy or people ruining our lives. However, there are some circumstances in which we turn things upside down for ourselves and for others.
This is the situation to which Isaiah 29:16 is referring when the Lord declares, “You turn things upside down.”
It’s one thing to have others or to have outside forces turn our live upside down. It’s an entirely different matter when we are the ones turning things upside down for the bad.
Before we look at some of the messages from Isaiah 29, here is the setting.
Background
Isaiah lived about 100 years before the birth of Jesus.
The prophet Isaiah lived at a time when 2/3 of Israel was ravaged by troops from northern Iraq. All that was left of Israel was the region in the south where Jerusalem was located.
You would think that the invasion and occupation of northern Israel would have caused the survivors in southern Israel to humble themselves, wake up and turn their lives to God, but just the opposite happened. The people in southern Israel came up with this weird formulation that since they were spared from the invasion, it must be obvious that they were highly favored and could do no wrong. God would never allow them to be conquered.
The Lord is furious with the attitude of the people in southern Israel and so he appoints a priest named Isaiah to warn the people of hard times to come unless they repent. The Lord offers them forgiveness and mercy if they will just love and honor him.
In Isaiah chapter 29, the Lord chastises the people for doing just the opposite of what He had commanded.
This then brings us to some of the lessons from Isaiah 20.
We Turn Things Upside Down When We Serve God With Our Mouths But Not With Our Hearts, Our Hands, Our Minds, Our Feet.
Isaiah 29:13
Every day we turn our lives upside down when we do just the opposite of what we say even to ourselves that we won’t do. We say to ourselves,
“I’m not going to lose my temper today.”
“I’m not going to eat that bowl of ice cream before I go to sleep tonight.”
“I’m not going to waste an hour on the internet.”
And then we go and do it.
Everyday then we need to rely on Christ. We need him to keep our lives right side up. We can’t do it on our own.
Jesus is the only one who ever lived completely right side up. Everything in his life was in proper order, sequence and direction.
Jesus, help me fight the temptations that I will battle today. Do not let me succumb. Be my strength. Be my defense. Be my offense. Be my wall.
Let what I say be consistent with what I do. Only you can help me.
We Turn Things Upside Down When We Start Telling God What To Do
Isaiah 29: 16
The Lord reminds us that we are all clay pots. How’s that for a reality check?
Sometimes the Bible describes us as amazing creations of God. In today’s terms, we are more impressive than the most complicated computer. In Psalm 139, God builds us up as being fearfully and wonderfully made. In other words, it’s scary to think just how marvelous God created us to be.
But because of our sinful human nature, we can’t handle such compliments. We get huge headed, and we get too full of ourselves. That’s when God has to humble us in verses such as Isaiah 29:16.
Bible scholars say that many people of southern Israel, called Judah, in Isaiah’s day thought they were smarter than God. They thought that they could make alliances and treaties with neighboring nations and that these unions would insure protection against the intimidating troops from northern Iraq called Assyria back then.
The people thought that they had a better plan than what God could come up with. They took matters into their own hands, and so the Lord had to let them know that He is the potter and we humans are the clay or the pots.
Today, too, when we think that we know so much with our Twittering, Blackberries, and Googling, God sobers us by declaring we are nothing but wet clay or dry pots. Any IQ we have, virtual or real, are from the Lord.
All wisdom is centered also in Jesus Christ, God’s Son. In Jesus is all of God’s knowledge and information. In Christ, we find the solutions to life’s problems.
God Will Turn Things Right Side Up.
Isaiah 29: 17-19
The tall forests of Lebanon (enemy of Israel) will become wheat firelds
Isaiah 29:17
The blind shall see
Isaiah 29:18
The meek and poor (who are in tears) shall have joy
Isaiah 29:19
When we are upside down, God will turn us right side up. When everything in our lives are out of kilter, God will put things back in place.
The intimidating country of Lebanon would be humbled.
The blind will be given sight.
The powerless and poor will celebrate.
We may make a mess and mockery of our lives, but Jesus is there to put the pieces together.
The president of one of our church’s seminaries gave a sermon earlier this year.
Humpty Dumpty fell off the wall -- Wall Street. And all the king’s horses and the king’s men couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty together again.
Even God though can put together Wall Street if He chooses. When people on Wall Street and we on Lua Kula Street and Puunui Street are humbled and are crawling on stomachs and realizing that the Lord Almight reigns, then the Lord will put us together again.
Then will He make things right side up again.
Because Jesus Christ lived the perfect upright life for us, God will put us upright also. Because Jesus paid the price for the damages we have done in turning things upside down for the worse, God will make the arrogant forests into humble fields, the blind will see, and the poor in spirit will rejoice.
In Jesus’ name.
Amen.
Saturday, August 29, 2009
No Other Good Alternative
Sermon from: August 16, 2009
11th Sunday after Pentecost
Based on Scripture: John 6: 51-59 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%206:51-59;&version=NIV;
Introduction
In Stephen Crane’s novel The Red Badge of Courage, the main character is an 18 year old private who deserts his Union battalion in the heat of battle. The young soldier’s name is Henry Fleming. Henry justifies his actions on the basis that the particular battle being fought was a lost cause and his efforts would not have mattered at all.
In this morning’s Scripture reading from John 6, we read of a desertion, too, but it is not of just one person like Henry Fleming, it is a desertion by many people. The many people who are leaving are disciples of Jesus who like Henry feel that they are in a lost cause.
Not all of Jesus’ disciples, however, walk up and leave Jesus. His original Twelve disciples stick by him at least for this incident. They see correctly that they are better off with Jesus than with anyone or anything else.
Here’s a little more background on John 6.
Background
Jesus had more disciples than just his 12 original disciples. Many of his disciples stayed with him for a while. But an event in Jesus’ third year as full time rabbi caused them to pick up and leave Jesus.
What is so astonishing about this mass exodus of disciples is that Jesus had just done a miracle that no one else on earth had ever done prior or duplicated since. Jesus had just fed at least 5,000 people with just five small barley loaves and two small fish.
You would think that the fresh excitement and wonder of that miracle would have kept the disciples’ commitment to Jesus going for months and years.
But that miracle had just the opposite effect. The feeding of the 5,000 people made the disciples of Jesus want even more. They were asking, “Why just one feeding? If you can feed us once why not every day as Moses fed the people of Israel everyday in the wilderness for 40 years?”
Instead of assuring is disciples, however, that he would give them just what they wanted, Jesus says in essence, “I am feeding you everyday but not with physical bread as Moses feed your ancestors. I am feeding you with spiritual bread everyday and I am that spiritual bread.”
When Jesus speaks these words to his many disciples, there patience has already been worn thin. They feel that they have been with Jesus a long time (two years or so) and He hasn’t delivered on what they thought the Messiah should be doing which is basically fixing all their problems immediately and providing them with all their wants and needs.
And so when Jesus gives them a hard to understand topic such as spiritual bread and that he is spiritual bread, the disciples say to themselves, “We don’t need any more hard teachings. We’ve had enough hard teachings. Give us physical food everyday. Give us freedom from Rome. Give us universal health care coverage by healing everyone and not just a few people here and there in pockets as you see fit. We’ve had one hard teaching too many. We’re out of here.” And they leave.
We can reflect on a number of lessons from this incident and from Jesus’ so called hard teaching.
IF WE GET CAUGHT UP IN THE GIVE ME MORE SYNDROME TOWARD GOD, EVERY TEACHING FROM CHRIST WILL SEEM TOO HARD.
The many disciples of Jesus were caught in a spiraling motion of always wanting more.
Jesus feeds at least 5,000 people one day, and the disciples want him to feed everyone everyday.
Jesus heals some sick people, and the disciples wonder why he doesn’t heal everyone.
Jesus teaches them that he is the truth and the truth will set you free, and Jesus’ disciples want him to free them from Roman bondage immediately.
The disciples of Jesus were no different than the people of Israel 1,400 years earlier who were never satisfied with the manna and quail which God sent to them in the wilderness.
Too often we also get caught up in this wanting more and more vortex. Christ gets us out of a jam and immediately we want him to rescue us out of another fix.
Christ solves one of our problems, and we wonder why he doesn’t take care of all of our predicaments.
Jesus comes to our rescue, and as soon as we are bailed out, we’re on his case to deliver us from another mess.
One of the outcomes of being continually demanding of Christ is that our hearts and minds become plugged up and we cannot understand the big, bill board size messages that Jesus sends us. These cinema screen size messages become too difficult for us to understand because our minds are whirling with 9 font size details of paying the HELCO bill, or finding $40 to fill up our car with gas. When are minds are overloaded with these worries, we cannot process the teachings of Jesus that are multiple times more important than our concerns as important as they may seem.
Instead of wanting more, we ask God to give us the concentration to thank Him more for the essentials He is already giving us. Let’s start with oxygen, let’s think of 85 degree heat instead of 125 degree heat, let’s think of water, and how about everlasting life that trumps any need that we have.
The Holy Spirit can un-clutter our minds of the thousands of details in there so that we can understand the simple, and most important things that matter. Jesus is the Bread of Life, He is the staple of life, He is the essential of life, He is basic food for life. He gives us all the resources we need to be more than sufficient.
THERE ARE THOUSANDS OF ALTERNATIVES TO CHRIST, BUT NONE CAN GIVE WHAT HE GIVES.
Peter makes that beautiful testimony in John 6: 68 and 69. Let’s read those verses together, “Simon Peter answered him, ‘Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.’”
The once agnostic scholar C.S. Lewis who became a Christian later in his life once said something to the effect of, “The problem with all religions other than Christianity is that they are 90% right.”
What Lewis meant is that what makes it so confusing for a person who is searching for the true religion is that 90% of most religions are true and so it makes choosing the right religion difficult.
For example, Buddhism has beautiful messages about not being materialistic and greedy and the lessons seem so close to Christianity. Yes, 90% of what Buddhism says is in harmony with Christianity, but it’s the 10% that conflicts or is missing that is the problem. For example, Buddhism teaches reincarnation. The Dalai Lama of Tibet for example, is the 14th reincarnation of a Buddhist teacher who lived as a monk 400 years ago. When the current Dalai Lama dies, his disciples will then choose a child to lead them whom they believe is the 15th reincarnation of the monk.
And so for all religions except Christianity, it’s the 10% that is missing that makes it 100% different from Christianity.
The missing 10% in all non-Christian religions is Jesus Christ who is God the Son, the only Savior of human beings, and who is the only way to heaven.
That portion missing in non-Christian religions makes every religion 100% different from Christianity.
And so Peter is 100% right when he says, “Lord, to whom shall we go. You have the words of eternal life.”
For us, too, what other viable alternative is there? We may wrongly think that God is too slow, too lenient to others, too unresponsive, but what are the alternatives?
What other religions give us the free Bread of Life not obtained by working harder or becoming better persons but based solely on the mercy of God received by trusting in Christ as our Savior?
WE MAY DESERT GOD, BUT HE WILL NOT DESERT US.
Many of Jesus’ disciples walked off and left him, but God promises that he will never leave us stranded.
I always thought Captain Morgan was a fictional pirate. I did not realize that there was a real buccaneer named Captain Henry Morgan who robbed ships especially in the Caribbean and West Indies waters.
In fact in a bizarre occurrence, the British government bestowed on him the status of knighthood because Captain Morgan destroyed Spanish ships in the Atlantic waters between North and South America.
In any event on a trip back to England, Captain Morgan deserted his own crew and took off with the booty which his men had captured.
Some leaders may desert their own followers, but God never will.
In Hebrews 13:5, the writer quotes Deuteronomy 31:6 in which the Lord promises, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”
The same goes for Jesus, God the Son. We may forsake him but he will never forsake us.
When we struggle with illnesses that don’t get healed, bills that don’t get paid, or conflicts that don’t get resolved, Christ is there with us. Bread is the symbol that we are going to have enough to make it through the day. Jesus is the reality that we are going to make through not only today but for eternity.
Conclusion
In the novel referred to earlier, The Red Badge of Courage, Henry Fleming realizes the mistake he made by flaking out on his comrades. He gets a number of chances and he fights courageously in a number of battles.
The book ends with Henry, the deserter, experiencing peace for his tormented soul.
Jesus gives to us peace also for our troubled souls but not because we do heroic acts as Henry Fleming did in order to redeem himself. Jesus gives us comfort because He did the heroic act of sacrificing himself on the cross. Because of Jesus, the Lord receives us with open arms even though we have too frequently abandoned him. He welcomes us as if nothing happened because Jesus made it all happen for us to receive God’s forgiveness.
The Lord will never forsake us as we cling to Christ our Savior.
Amen.
11th Sunday after Pentecost
Based on Scripture: John 6: 51-59 http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=John%206:51-59;&version=NIV;
Introduction
In Stephen Crane’s novel The Red Badge of Courage, the main character is an 18 year old private who deserts his Union battalion in the heat of battle. The young soldier’s name is Henry Fleming. Henry justifies his actions on the basis that the particular battle being fought was a lost cause and his efforts would not have mattered at all.
In this morning’s Scripture reading from John 6, we read of a desertion, too, but it is not of just one person like Henry Fleming, it is a desertion by many people. The many people who are leaving are disciples of Jesus who like Henry feel that they are in a lost cause.
Not all of Jesus’ disciples, however, walk up and leave Jesus. His original Twelve disciples stick by him at least for this incident. They see correctly that they are better off with Jesus than with anyone or anything else.
Here’s a little more background on John 6.
Background
Jesus had more disciples than just his 12 original disciples. Many of his disciples stayed with him for a while. But an event in Jesus’ third year as full time rabbi caused them to pick up and leave Jesus.
What is so astonishing about this mass exodus of disciples is that Jesus had just done a miracle that no one else on earth had ever done prior or duplicated since. Jesus had just fed at least 5,000 people with just five small barley loaves and two small fish.
You would think that the fresh excitement and wonder of that miracle would have kept the disciples’ commitment to Jesus going for months and years.
But that miracle had just the opposite effect. The feeding of the 5,000 people made the disciples of Jesus want even more. They were asking, “Why just one feeding? If you can feed us once why not every day as Moses fed the people of Israel everyday in the wilderness for 40 years?”
Instead of assuring is disciples, however, that he would give them just what they wanted, Jesus says in essence, “I am feeding you everyday but not with physical bread as Moses feed your ancestors. I am feeding you with spiritual bread everyday and I am that spiritual bread.”
When Jesus speaks these words to his many disciples, there patience has already been worn thin. They feel that they have been with Jesus a long time (two years or so) and He hasn’t delivered on what they thought the Messiah should be doing which is basically fixing all their problems immediately and providing them with all their wants and needs.
And so when Jesus gives them a hard to understand topic such as spiritual bread and that he is spiritual bread, the disciples say to themselves, “We don’t need any more hard teachings. We’ve had enough hard teachings. Give us physical food everyday. Give us freedom from Rome. Give us universal health care coverage by healing everyone and not just a few people here and there in pockets as you see fit. We’ve had one hard teaching too many. We’re out of here.” And they leave.
We can reflect on a number of lessons from this incident and from Jesus’ so called hard teaching.
IF WE GET CAUGHT UP IN THE GIVE ME MORE SYNDROME TOWARD GOD, EVERY TEACHING FROM CHRIST WILL SEEM TOO HARD.
The many disciples of Jesus were caught in a spiraling motion of always wanting more.
Jesus feeds at least 5,000 people one day, and the disciples want him to feed everyone everyday.
Jesus heals some sick people, and the disciples wonder why he doesn’t heal everyone.
Jesus teaches them that he is the truth and the truth will set you free, and Jesus’ disciples want him to free them from Roman bondage immediately.
The disciples of Jesus were no different than the people of Israel 1,400 years earlier who were never satisfied with the manna and quail which God sent to them in the wilderness.
Too often we also get caught up in this wanting more and more vortex. Christ gets us out of a jam and immediately we want him to rescue us out of another fix.
Christ solves one of our problems, and we wonder why he doesn’t take care of all of our predicaments.
Jesus comes to our rescue, and as soon as we are bailed out, we’re on his case to deliver us from another mess.
One of the outcomes of being continually demanding of Christ is that our hearts and minds become plugged up and we cannot understand the big, bill board size messages that Jesus sends us. These cinema screen size messages become too difficult for us to understand because our minds are whirling with 9 font size details of paying the HELCO bill, or finding $40 to fill up our car with gas. When are minds are overloaded with these worries, we cannot process the teachings of Jesus that are multiple times more important than our concerns as important as they may seem.
Instead of wanting more, we ask God to give us the concentration to thank Him more for the essentials He is already giving us. Let’s start with oxygen, let’s think of 85 degree heat instead of 125 degree heat, let’s think of water, and how about everlasting life that trumps any need that we have.
The Holy Spirit can un-clutter our minds of the thousands of details in there so that we can understand the simple, and most important things that matter. Jesus is the Bread of Life, He is the staple of life, He is the essential of life, He is basic food for life. He gives us all the resources we need to be more than sufficient.
THERE ARE THOUSANDS OF ALTERNATIVES TO CHRIST, BUT NONE CAN GIVE WHAT HE GIVES.
Peter makes that beautiful testimony in John 6: 68 and 69. Let’s read those verses together, “Simon Peter answered him, ‘Lord to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.’”
The once agnostic scholar C.S. Lewis who became a Christian later in his life once said something to the effect of, “The problem with all religions other than Christianity is that they are 90% right.”
What Lewis meant is that what makes it so confusing for a person who is searching for the true religion is that 90% of most religions are true and so it makes choosing the right religion difficult.
For example, Buddhism has beautiful messages about not being materialistic and greedy and the lessons seem so close to Christianity. Yes, 90% of what Buddhism says is in harmony with Christianity, but it’s the 10% that conflicts or is missing that is the problem. For example, Buddhism teaches reincarnation. The Dalai Lama of Tibet for example, is the 14th reincarnation of a Buddhist teacher who lived as a monk 400 years ago. When the current Dalai Lama dies, his disciples will then choose a child to lead them whom they believe is the 15th reincarnation of the monk.
And so for all religions except Christianity, it’s the 10% that is missing that makes it 100% different from Christianity.
The missing 10% in all non-Christian religions is Jesus Christ who is God the Son, the only Savior of human beings, and who is the only way to heaven.
That portion missing in non-Christian religions makes every religion 100% different from Christianity.
And so Peter is 100% right when he says, “Lord, to whom shall we go. You have the words of eternal life.”
For us, too, what other viable alternative is there? We may wrongly think that God is too slow, too lenient to others, too unresponsive, but what are the alternatives?
What other religions give us the free Bread of Life not obtained by working harder or becoming better persons but based solely on the mercy of God received by trusting in Christ as our Savior?
WE MAY DESERT GOD, BUT HE WILL NOT DESERT US.
Many of Jesus’ disciples walked off and left him, but God promises that he will never leave us stranded.
I always thought Captain Morgan was a fictional pirate. I did not realize that there was a real buccaneer named Captain Henry Morgan who robbed ships especially in the Caribbean and West Indies waters.
In fact in a bizarre occurrence, the British government bestowed on him the status of knighthood because Captain Morgan destroyed Spanish ships in the Atlantic waters between North and South America.
In any event on a trip back to England, Captain Morgan deserted his own crew and took off with the booty which his men had captured.
Some leaders may desert their own followers, but God never will.
In Hebrews 13:5, the writer quotes Deuteronomy 31:6 in which the Lord promises, “Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”
The same goes for Jesus, God the Son. We may forsake him but he will never forsake us.
When we struggle with illnesses that don’t get healed, bills that don’t get paid, or conflicts that don’t get resolved, Christ is there with us. Bread is the symbol that we are going to have enough to make it through the day. Jesus is the reality that we are going to make through not only today but for eternity.
Conclusion
In the novel referred to earlier, The Red Badge of Courage, Henry Fleming realizes the mistake he made by flaking out on his comrades. He gets a number of chances and he fights courageously in a number of battles.
The book ends with Henry, the deserter, experiencing peace for his tormented soul.
Jesus gives to us peace also for our troubled souls but not because we do heroic acts as Henry Fleming did in order to redeem himself. Jesus gives us comfort because He did the heroic act of sacrificing himself on the cross. Because of Jesus, the Lord receives us with open arms even though we have too frequently abandoned him. He welcomes us as if nothing happened because Jesus made it all happen for us to receive God’s forgiveness.
The Lord will never forsake us as we cling to Christ our Savior.
Amen.
Monday, August 10, 2009
A Man In A Meltdown
- Sermon: Agust 9, 2009
- Scripture: 1 Kings 19:1-8
- 10th Sunday after Pentecost
We’ve heard of nuclear plant meltdowns:
Homer Simpson
China syndrome
Chernobyl
3 Mile Island
Some of us may even recall a really bad meltdown near Idaho Falls back in 1961.
In a meltdown, a once tightly designed nuclear reactor just disintegrates and consumes itself.
In our Bible text from I Kings 19 there once was a man in Israel who could be compared to a mini nuclear plant. His name was Elijah. His zeal for the Lord was radioactive in intensity.
There seemed no way possible that Elijah, this specimen of strenth, this generator of energy, would ever experience a melt down. No, not Elijah, Not, this human nuclear power plant for the Lord.
However, sometimes even nuclear reactor type humans sizzle and fizzle into desapair and hopelessness.
The meltdown of Elijah in the wilderness is an encouragement for us because sometimes we might feel less than normal or inferior to others when we are on the verge of an emotional and physical implosion.
No even the great ones like Elijah collapsed and wanted nothing to do with God, with life, with himself and with others.
However, we don’t only receive encouragement in knowing that the heroes at times want to give it all up, but more importantly, we receive strength in knowing that God will be there for us when we feel like saying aloha, fare thee well, to the Lord and His mission for us here on this earth.
BACKGROUND
Here’s a little background on Elijah and I Kings 19 before we look at some of the lessons from today’s text.
Elijah lived about 1,000 years before Jesus was born.
He lived at a time when the Kingdom of Israel was split in two.
The history of Israel is sort of like the history of the U.S.
Just as the U.S. divided into North and South during the Civil War, so did Israel separate into North and South.
The big difference was that in the U.S. the North and South joined back together again. In Israel, the North and South never re-united. The North was completely wiped out, and so only the South continued on. There has never been an authentic formal treaty of unity between the North and the South in Israel even till today again because there is no North Israel to sign such a unity pact.
In any event Elijah is sent to the North to work for the Lord. The same territory which Elijah served would be Jesus’ territory a thousand years later. That’s why when Jesus came upon the scene, people were saying that he was Elijah sent back to earth from heaven.
We have very good Bible scholars in this congregation. Check me out on this.
Elijah and his disciple Elisha healed people and even raised persons from the dead.
Here’s the question. Between the time of Elijah and his disciple Elisha and the time when Jesus arrives, was there any prophet after who healed people or resurrected them from the dead?
Yes, there were many miracles that took place between Elijah/Elisha and Jesus. There was the miracle of Daniel in the Lions Den and Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, but these were miracles done directly by God. Was there any prophet after Elijah/Elisha up until the time of Jesus whom God gave the power to heal diseases and bring people back to life?
I can’t think of any.
And this is why Elijah is so huge in the Jewish faith. This is why many Jewish people treat Elijah as the greatest man on earth next to healed people of diseases or resurrected people who have died.
And they are waiting for a messiah who will do what Elijah did.
For Christians that Messiah came 1,000 years later at Christmas.
For the Jewish people, it has been 3,000 years since Elijah went to heaven and there has been no messiah in their eyes to carry on Elijah’s work.
1. The danger wtih fatigue, overload,and overstress is that we don’t think straight when we are tired.
All kinds of yucky thoughts go through our minds.
(1 Kings 19: 3,4)
Michael Jackson, Billy Mays , known for their energy. Even people with nuclear reactor energy break down with fatigue and overload.
2. Sometimes it doesn’t take a nuclear physicist or a brain surgeon to solve a problem.
(1 Kings 19: 5)
“Arise and eat.”
And then what happens
(1 Kings 19: 6,7)
“Arise and eat.” Gospel lesson: John 6: 35-51
Communion? Seminary profs say no. There are other verses that refer to communion. These verses simply talk about faith in Jesus to be like eating bread.
3. God can put together nuclear reactors and people back together.
(1 Kings 19:8)
Chernobyl not in operation.
3 Mile Island?
God repairs and restores Elijah.
He can do the same for us.
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