The beautiful prize for which I run

 

 THE PERFECT FRUIT WILL NEVER END

When I was a child, I spoke about childish matters, for I saw things like a child and reasoned like a child. 

But the day came when I matured, and I set aside my childish ways.

For now we see but a faint reflection of riddles and mysteries as though reflected in a mirror, but one day we will see face-to-face. My understanding is incomplete now, but one day I will understand everything, just as everything about me has been fully understood. 

Until then, there are three things that remain: faith, hope, and love—yet love surpasses them all.  

So above all else: let love be the beautiful prize for which you run. 

1 CORINTHIANS 13

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

Galatians 5:22

What do you see?

 Yahweh asked, “what do you see?”

“Figs,” I said. “Some are very good, but the others are very bad, too rotten to eat.”

Then Yahweh replied, “This is what I, Yahweh, the God of Israel, say to you: ‘The good figs are the people of Judah whom I sent away in exile to Babylon.  My eyes will compassionately watch over them for their good,  to bring them back to this land, to build them up and not to tear them down, to plant them and not to uproot them.  I will give them a willing heart to know that I am Yahweh. They will be my beloved people, and I will be their loving God, for they will return to me with every passion of their heart. 

“ ‘As for the bad figs that were too rotten to eat, they represent those who went to live in Egypt. I will punish them with such a disaster that everyone on earth will tremble in horror when they hear about it. I will force the people of Judah to go to foreign countries, where they will be an object of scorn, cursing, and insult.  I will send the sword, food shortages, and plague against them until they have vanished from the land I gave to them and their ancestors.’ ” 

                                                     Jeremiah 24 

And the OLD prophet asked: Where the young prophet went?    

And he said unto his sons: saddle me the ass. So they saddled him the ass: and he rode thereon and went after the man of God ( the young prophet ), and found him sitting under an oak: and he said unto him: Are you the man of God? And he replied: I am.

   Then the old prophet said unto him: 'Come home with me, and eat bread'.

   And he said, I may not return with thee, nor go in with thee: neither will I eat bread nor drink water with thee in this place. For it was said to me by the Word of the Lord: Thou shalt eat NO bread NOR drink water there, NOR turn again to go by the way that thou came.

    So the old prophet  said unto him: I am a prophet also just as you are; and an angel spake unto me by the word of the Lord, saying: Bring him back with thee into your house, that he may eat bread and drink water. But HE WAS LYING to the young prophet.

    So the young prophet ( man of God ) went back with him, and did eat bread in his house, and DRANK WATER.

    And it came to pass, as they sat at the table, that the word of the Lord came unto the old prophet that brought him back.

   And he 'cried' unto the man of God, saying: Thus saith the Lord: BECAUSE YOU disobeyed the mouth of the Lord, and did not keep the commandment which the Lord thy God commanded thee, and came back, and ate bread and drunk water in the place, of the which the Lord did say to thee, Eat no bread, and drink no water; your body shall not be buried in the grave of your fathers.

And when he was gone, a lion met him by the way, and slew him: and his carcass was cast in the way, and the ass stood by it, the lion also stood by the carcass. And, behold, men passed by, and saw the carcass cast in the way, and the lion standing by the carcass: and they came and told it in the city where the old prophet dwelt. 

                                        I Kings 13:11-25                                                                 

the BLOOD SPEAKS

 

We may feel alone, but we aren’t. We are surrounded by an army of witnesses. They have run the race of faith and finished well. 

It is now our turn.

 You have not come to the place that can be touched (as Israel did at Mount Sinai)—to a mountain crowned with blazing fire, darkness, gloom, and a windstorm— or to the blast of a trumpet and the sound of a voice—a voice and message so harsh that the people begged not to hear another word.  ( The sight was so terrible that even Moses said, “I am trembling with fear.”)

NO, instead you have come to Mount Zion, to the city of the living God, to the heavenly Jerusalem, to heavenly messengers unnumbered, to a joyful feast, to the assembly of the firstborn registered as heaven’s citizens, to God the righteous Judge of all, and to the spirits of all the righteous who have been perfected. You have come to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant between God and humanity, and to His sprinkled blood, which speaks a greater word than the blood of Abel crying out from the earth.

See that you don’t turn away from the One who is speaking; for if the ones who heard and refused the One who spoke on earth faced punishment, then how much more will we suffer if we turn away from the One speaking from heaven.

“Yet once more I will shake not only the earth, but also the heavens”

 Hebrews 12

Goddess of Fortune ( Lady Luck )

 

Day after day I, Yahweh, have graciously outstretched my hands 

to a people who turned their backs to me,

whose way of life is corrupt,

who insist on going their own way. 

They are a people who continually insult me to my face.

They openly and defiantly offer sacrifices to their gods

in their sacred groves.

 For you who forsake Yahweh

and ignore my holy mountain,

who celebrate a feast for the goddess called Lady Luck 

and fill cups of wine to toast the god Destiny, 

know this: your luck has run out.

Isaiah 65:11