Coming to the Still Waters

Today's verses are Lamentations 2:12-16, which read, 12 - They say to their mothers, "Where is grain and wine?"  As they faint like a wounded man in the streets of the city, as their life is poured out on their mother's bosom. 13 - How shall I admonish you?  To what shall I compare you, O daughter of Jerusalem?  To what shall I liken you as I comfort you, O virgin daughter of Zion?  For your ruin is as vast as the sea; who can heal you? 14 - Your prophets have seen for you false and foolish visions; and they have not exposed your iniquity so as to restore you from captivity, but they have seen for you false and misleading oracles. 15 - All who pass along the way clap their hands in derision at you; they hiss and shake their heads at the daughter of Jerusalem, "Is this the city of which they said, 'The perfection of beauty, a joy to all the earth'?" 16 - All your enemies have opened their mouths wide against you; they hiss and gna...

"The sun comes up, it's a new day dawning" and that is what I am seeing outside my office window.  I am getting reading to preach my third time through the parable of the soils or sower this morning because I have handled the book of Matthew and Mark and now into Luke.  Something so familiar is sometimes hard to preach but I think, as always, God pulled through with directing me where to go.  Here is the broadcast this morning and I hope you have a great day.  --Adam--

Today's verses are Lamentations 2:6-11, which read, 6 - And He has violently treated His tabernacle like a garden booth; He has destroyed His appointed meeting place.  The LORD has caused to be forgotten the appointed feast and sabbath in Zion, and He has despised king and priest in the indignation of His anger. 7 - The Lord has rejected His altar, He has abandoned His sanctuary; He has delivered into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces.  They have made a noise in the house of the LORD as in the day of an appointed feast. 8 - The LORD determined to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion.  He has stretched out a line, He has not restrained His hand from destroying, and He has caused rampart and wall to lament; they have languished together. 9 - Her gates have sunk into the ground, He has destroyed and broken her bars.  Her king and her princes are among the nations; the law is no more.  Also, her prophets find no vision from the LORD...

We worked up the garden last evening and we also bought seeds so you know what is coming.  It is so great to grow our own food.  How I wish every yard had a garden in our town.  Not only for the nutritional value but because some of the greatest times I had while growing up was spending time in the garden with my parents.  There were 6 of us and my mom loved to can so our garden was a full acre!  Our grocery store was right out our back door.  So many lessons were learned there that have been replaced by other things, electronically and schedule wise.  To have a garden usually means some of those things get turned off and like time together around the table is so important to the life of your family, so is working together in the garden.  Okay, done with my rant and onto my day!   --Adam--

Today's verses are Lamentations 2:1-5, which read, 1 - How the Lord has covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in His anger!  He has cast from heaven to earth the glory of Israel, and has not remembered His footstool in the day of His anger. 2 - The Lord has swallowed up; He has not spared all the habitations of Jacob.  In His wrath He has thrown down the strongholds of the daughter of Judah; He has brought them down to the ground; He has profaned the kingdom and its princes. 3 - In fierce anger He has cut off all the strength of Israel; He has drawn back His right hand from before the enemy.  And He has burned in Jacob like a flaming fire consuming round about. 4 - He has bent His bow like an enemy; He has set His right hand like an adversary and slain all that were pleasant to the eye; in the tent of the daughter of Zion He has poured out His wrath like fire. 5 - The Lord has become like an enemy.  He has swallowed up Israel; He has swallowe...

A thank you to www.biblegateway.com and their audio of the Bible.  You will really appreciate this as we start the book of 1 Chronicles soon.  It is another long list of names that you will hear someone pronounce those names right and not my butchering of them.  May this day bring to you and opportunity to say His name to someone who needs to hear it.  --Adam--

Today's devotional is an in between chapter one and we will get back to Lamentations 2 on Wednesday.  This might seem more like some of your pastor's thoughts as he prepares for future messages and also projects I am working on myself.  These are things that are important to me and rise to the top of my list. The first is the idea of creating some time for feedback.  I preach a sermon every Sunday but we don't have a time to have some interchange about it.  I am investigating how we could have a question time that might focus on that passage but also maybe something else that has been burning in your mind.  We all have questions and I am not the answer man of it all by far but it could be helpful to create a time where they are welcome and handled better than just a short conversation in the foyer before leaving.  Our technology has allowed us to hear the message even away from the public proclamation on Sunday morning but again that is only one sided ...

Good Sunday morning to you all who read this blog.  Spring seems to have arrived in Illinois.  I am so challenged by every verse in the Bible.  Even the transition passages hold great truths to learn and apply.  Here is the latest Sunday morning radio broadcast which is following what I have been preaching, just a week later.  --Adam-- 

A quick trip to Michigan to see Jason, Samantha, Libby (Elisabeth) and Tae-Tae (Taylor).  It was Libby's third birthday this week.  We miss them so but they are doing great in the church God has placed them.  The snow is gone here but it is still a frosty morning.  --Adam--

Here is the Bible reading of the day.  It is a better recording as I experiment how to do this.  This is also a travel day for Stephanie and I to celebrate the 3rd birthday of our dear Libby.  So a lot of windshield time and flipping the channels on the radio.  --Adam--

Today's verses are Lamentations 1:15-22, which read, 15    “The  Lord has rejected all my strong men i n my midst;  He has called an appointed time against me t o crush my  young men; t he Lord has  trodden  as in  a wine press t he virgin daughter of Judah. 16    “For these things I   weep; m y eyes run down with water; b ecause far from me is a  comforter, o ne who restores my soul.   My children are desolate b ecause the enemy has prevailed.” 17    Zion   stretches out her hands; t here is no one to comfort her; t he  Lord  has  commanded concerning Jacob t hat the ones round about him should be his adversaries;  Jerusalem has become an unclean thing among them. 18    “The   Lord   is   righteous; f or I have  rebelled against His command; hear now, all peoples, a nd  behold my pain; m y virgins and my young men h ave gone int...

I introduced a new way of listening to the Bible.  I am thankful for www.biblegateway.com that can pronounce these words.  The recordings will greatly improve by Thursday.  On another front, I am amazed at how God can use 3 little verses that seem to be a transition from one big event to another to be a possible powerful passage for our period of time as a church.  I guess now I will have to speak of it in the near future.  --Adam--

Today's verses are Lamentations 1:8-14, which read, Jerusalem sinned greatly, therefore she has become an unclean thing.  All who honored her despise her because they have seen her nakedness; even she herself groans and turns away. Her uncleanness was in her skirts; she did not consider her future.  Therefore she has fallen astonishingly; she has no comforter.  "See, O LORD, my affliction, for the enemy has magnified himself!" The adversary has stretched out his hand over all her precious things, for she has seen the nations enter her sanctuary, the ones whom You commanded that they should not enter into Your congregation. All her people groan seeking bread; they have given their precious things for food to restore their lives themselves.  "See, O LORD, and look, for I am despised." "Is it nothing to all you who pass this way?  Look and see if there is any pain like my pain which was severely dealt out to me, which the LORD inflicted on...