The Choirmaster

Psalm 51 Have mercy on me, O God, according to Your steadfast love; according to Your abundant mercy blot our my transgressions. Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity and cleanse me from my sin! For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me. Against You, You only, have I sinned and done what is evil in Your sight, so that You may be justified in Your words and blameless in Your judgment. Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity and in sin did my mother conceive me. Behold, You delight in truth in the inward being, and You each me wisdom in the secret heart. Purse me with hyssop, and I shall be clean; wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow...Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me....Restore to me the joy of Your salvation and uphold me with a willing spirit...For You will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; You will not be pleased with a burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart, O God, You will not despise.

Are you hiding from God? Do you feel you have drifted so far that He cannot hear you or strayed so far that He cannot reach you or been so bad that He will not want you?

Like children caught in disobedience we fear the lecture, the punishment, the look of disappointment. I find that when God and I are at odds I just don't want to hear from Him. I will neglect Him, neglect prayer and the Scriptures. I do not want to be confronted with my sin.

This psalm was written by David after being confronted by the prophet Nathan regarding David's affair with Bathsheba and the subsequent murder of her husband, Uriah. And although, for a while, David hoped that somehow this had escaped God's attention, when he is confronted with his own sin he does exactly what we all should. He owns up.

Have mercy on me. Blot out my transgressions. I have sinned against You. Wash me in Your forgiveness and I will be clean. Create in me a pure heart. Restore my joy and I will praise you.

Erma Bombeck writes a funny story about the difference in raising boys and girls and to paraphrase it is this...If you yell upstairs to the kids and ask what they are doing the girls will say sweetly, Nothing mama, when in truth they are pouring a hundred dollars worth of make up and perfume down the drain. The boys will say, We are baptizing the cats in the commode!!

There is nothing that goes unnoticed by your heavenly Father and that thought scares me a little. The Scriptures say that everything is laid bare before Him to whom we must give an account. It also says that He loves mercy and is willing to forgive all things. You are not beyond His sight. You are not beyond His love. You have not gone too far. You are not alone. He lives to make intercession for your sin. He is waiting for you. Own up and be free. In Him.

The Brother

Genesis 27 Your brother came deceitfully, and he has taken away your blessing. Esau said, He took away my birthright, and behold, now he has taken away my blessing. Then he said, Have you not reserved a blessing for me? Isaac answered and said to Esau, Behold, I have made him lord over you, and all his brothers I have given to him for servants, and with grain and wine I have sustained him. What then can I do for you, my son? Esau said to his father, Have you but one blessing, my father? Bless me, even me also, O my father. And Esau lifted up his voice and wept.

How cunning are life and circumstances. How crafty is our enemy. Like a thief he steals from us, robs us of our inheritance and the life our father has longed to bequeath us. How can it be that our Father could have created one who chose to become so evil. How is it that our brother,so to speak, chose such a different pathway and turned forever his face from His father and grew into this formidable enemy who chooses to live this life of destruction. Greed is a very powerful motivator. Make no mistake, have no doubt of this...Satan does not seek only to harm you. He lives to destroy you.

Sometimes he almost succeeds. Today, like Esau, I cry to my Father, what is left for me? My brother has taken my birthright and now my blessing. What remains for me, my Father.

And so He speaks...but when you grow restless you shall break his yoke from your neck.

When you are ready Connie you will break away. You will leave the yoke of this life, break the bonds of slavery and be free to walk a different path. Life, bad choices, the enemy, they have all conspired to rob you of your birthright and blessing but I have not given you over to destruction. I have not given you up to death. I have reserved for you a blessing, a new hope, a treasure in life, a work to be done and a place in My kingdom. A life that will not fade away.

The Priest

Hebrews 5 In the days of His flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to Him who was able to save Him from death, and He was heard because of His reverence. Although He was a Son, He learned obedience through what He suffered. And being made perfect, He became the source of eternal salvation to all who obey Him, being designated by God a High Priest after the order of Melchizedek.

There is something so poignant about Jesus pleading with His Father for another way.

The Bible says that Jesus was the Lamb slain from before the foundations of the world. A worthy sacrifice. A willing offering. A necessary tragedy. But as a man...how He must have dreaded the cross. The pain. The shame. The separation. The sin. We cannot, in our limited imagination, fathom what He endured on the cross. We say that is is why He came and that He bore it willingly for us and that is true. Maybe it also makes us feel a little better to say that He had a job to do and it He did it well because the thought of Him pleading with His Father to be released from it breaks our hearts.

Why the cross? Why the unbearable suffering? Why did His suffering make Him perfect? This verse says that in God's eyes, in His plan, this way, this road, this suffering, made Jesus worthy to become the source of salvation for all mankind. God chose Him to become a High Priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

Melchizedek represents a priestly king. An ultimated authority welded to a high priest. A holy ruler. An eternal reigning man-king-priest.

And that changes everything. Jesus Christ was already a heavenly king but somehow in God's plan it was necessary for Him to become a man. A priest. A king. Everything is held together by Christ. He is everything. He is complete. And because He was willing to become complete by suffering, God has given Him a name above all others. He has honored Him for His obedience and sacrifice. A priest, a high priestly king...forever.

He is the only way to eternal life. He is the only way to the Father or to heaven. Faith in His death and acceptance of His sacrifice is the only way. He earned that right through His obedience, even to the point of death on the cross.

For your soul....He was willing.

The Knowledge

John 2 Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover feast, many believed in His name when they saw the signs that He was doing. But Jesus on His part did not entrust Himself to them, because He knew all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for He Himself knew what was in man.

This verse has always intrigued me because it seems to have such underlying messages, almost a play on words.

Jesus knew what was in man because He created man. Designed man. Understood man. He knew as it were, our blueprint. But it is one thing to design something, a computer or a car, and to know and understand all the intricate details of it, but it is quite another to become that which you have created.

Our Lord does all things well. He goes all the way. He becomes man.

We will never know all that was accomplished in Jesus becoming flesh but some things we are told in Scripture. Jesus became a physical embodiment of the living God, allowing us to see the spiritual in the physical. He became a God who could be touched, seen and enjoyed. He could say, If you want to see what God is really like, look at me. So we see Jesus laughing, crying, enjoying life while still maintaining His holiness and deity.

Scripture says He also came to offer a physical sacrifice for sin. A perfect lamb, slain once and for all time. An offering to the Father for the sin of the whole world. He paid the ultimate price for all to see. By hanging on the cross He became the God who shows us just how far He is willing to go to save His children.

But the Bible also says He came to share in our suffering, to bear the weight of the flesh and by doing so He is able to fully understand the temptation of the flesh because He bore the burden of it Himself. He knows what is in man because He became man.

It intimidates me that all that I am or think is laid bare before a holy God. He knows my thoughts, my intent and my behaviors. It shames me most of the time. It also comforts me that I have a high priest who understands me. Because He has been there. He is not just the God of the heavens, He is the God who draws near.

What a wonderful Savior is Jesus our Lord. He became acquainted with our struggles by bearing them in His own flesh. Healing us with His own stripes. Redeeming us with His own blood. And leaving us with this promise....It won't always be this way. I am coming back for you and will make all things.....new.

The Blessing

I Samuel 16 Fill your horn with oil, and go. I will send you to Jesse the Bethlehemite, for I have provided myself a king among his sons...But the Lord said to Samuel, Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature, because I have rejected him (Eliab the eldest). For the Lord sees not as man sees; man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart....And Jesse made seven of his sons pass before Samuel. And Samuel said to Jesse, The Lord has not chosen these. Are all of your sons here? And he said there remains yet the youngest but he is keeping the sheep...Now he, David, was ruddy and had beautiful eyes and was handsome. And the Lord said, Arise, anoint him...And the Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day forward.

Men. Loaves and fishes. Armies. Oil. Flour. Water. Voids.

All empty vessels, lacking what is needed to satisfy, without direction or ineffective until we are filled by Him for usefulness.

Jesus then took the loaves, and when He had given thanks, He distributed them...What a beautiful picture. Jesus lifting us up to His Father for His blessing on our lives. And in return the Father blesses us by sending an exact replica of Himself in the person of the Holy Spirit. It is the trinity of God working in complete unity and harmony in the lives or objects that they created. Taking the small, the weak, the insignificant and making the useful. Beautiful. Essential.

Like prayers rising up to heaven. Like the smoke of temple spices. Like oil running down into the beard. Like water for a parched throat. Like rain in the dessert. So is a life filled with His presence. Sunshine and rain, flowers and birds, lightning and wind, fire and thunder. We all await His presence to bring the glory.

It is His pleasure to do so. It seems good to Him. It is why He created you. For Himself. For His glory and for His pleasure.

Be willing. There is no greater treasure. It is your highest calling. Be found in Him and be complete.

The Bride

Genesis 6 The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. And the Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and it grieved Him to His heart. So the Lord said, I will blot out man whom I have created from the face of the land, man and animals and creeping things and birds of the heavens, for I am sorry that I have made them.

But Noah found favor in the eyes of the Lord.

Do you know someone who is making a difference in this life for the kingdom? Someone with a pure heart and clean hands? Someone who is steadfast, faithful and true? That rare person who practices faithfully the love of Christ, the joy found in knowing Him and the discipline required to be found obedient in Him.

I know someone like that. She might tell you that she is young, or immature or prone to make mistakes but to me, she is a giant in the faith.

And if you were not at her wedding last month you missed a really beautiful picture of the bride of Christ.

Without our faith in Christ there is little to hold us steady. Without Him there is no reason to remain pure. If the Bible is a lie or He is not risen then we should eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die. We should get all we can. We should indulge every passion. The Scripture says that if we have hope in this life only then we are of all people most to be pitied. We are fools and the life we live is meaningless.

So what makes a young person remain pure? What makes a junky stay clean? What makes someone give up all they have and travel the world to tell people the good news?

What can make me white as snow?

Nothing.

But the blood of Jesus.

Thought changing. Life altering. Heart saving.

He steps into our lives and changes forever our perspective. And suddenly, and usually for the first time, we come to the realization that we are not our own and our life is not our own. We have been purchased. A pearl of great price. A virgin betrothed to a worthy King.

In the spiritual and in the physical, it is beautiful to behold.

A life that matters for the kingdom. A daughter that waits for the King. Clothed in righteousness. A garden locked up. A pearl of great price.

One man, Noah, saved the world entire from extinction.

One man, Jesus Christ, saved the world entire from death and hell.

What is the worth of one righteous person?

Only He knows for sure.

The Choices

Genesis 4 The Lord said to Cain, Why are you angry, and why has your face fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.

Have you ever started in a direction in life and heard a small voice in your heart saying, stop!? Ever wonder why we make such bad decisions when we're angry?

Rejection. Anger. Self destruction. Like falling water, gathering speed, following itself, is anger that is misguided. It is Cain murdering his brother. Because he is angry with God.

So many actions of God's people are a result of anger with God. We won't talk about it. We refuse to admit it. We may be consciously oblivious to it. But occasionally, in moments of clarity of thought or transparency of feeling we realize that we have repressed or suppressed feeling of fury toward Him.

Why did this happen? Why is he dead? Why did she cheat? Why is He not pleased with me? Why me?

The first act of sin committed in the garden was, in part, due to anger at God. Eve believed a lie, from the father of lies, when he said that God was holding out on them, tricking them, cheating them out of something wonderful that He wanted to selfishly keep for Himself. So an act of rebellion was costly not only to Eve and to all the generations to follow but costly also to the God who is trying to protect us from ourselves. And that same behavior is passed directly onto Eve's son, Cain.

So He comes to Cain just prior to his murdering his brother and says, Why are you SO angry? Be careful Cain because sin is lurking right outside your door and its desire is to crush you. To destroy YOU. Are you SURE that you want to travel this road?

And like angry, petulant children that we are we rush right ahead to our demise and His heartbreak. And just like the wonderful God He is, He lets us. And then He makes a way to reconcile us back to Himself, damage done and consequences pending.


And the Lord put a mark on Cain, lest any who found him should attack him.

And the Lord God made for Adam and his wife garments of skin and clothed them.

And the way of the cross made a way for us all.

Wonderful. Merciful. Savior. How weary You must be of us all and what a loving, patient, long suffering Father You are to Your wayward children. You are the best. Thank You for being merciful...for being the small voice that says, Are you sure you want to do this?