#Noah, the movie.Historical and Hysterical

Dear BLOG,
  What do you say about the movie we watched yesterday? Was it entertaining or what?!

You ask, 'but is that what really happened then?'

 I have to say, it does seem rather far fetched, so lets go check out a historical document of the event.

Lets see: Noah..hmmm, grandson of Methuselah...father of Shem, Ham and Japheth...yep, they got that right. But if we read Genesis 5: 32, the boys may have been triplets. Small differance really.(And Noah was five hundred years old when he became the father of Shem, Ham, and Japheth.[1])  But I wonder, Blog, if this verse is maybe, just a beside-the-point mention about the boys and is more a pointer to the fact that the next series of events - God's decision to wipe out the Earth came about when Noah was 500 years old. 

Anyway, there are the next few verses that sums up what happens next:Genesis 6. 
5 The LORD saw how great man's wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time.6 The LORD was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and his heart was filled with pain. 7 So the LORD said, "I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth--men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds of the air--for I am grieved that I have made them.8 But Noah found favor in the eyes of the LORD.
9 This is the account of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked with God.10 Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and Japheth. 13 So God said to Noah, "I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth.14 So make yourself an ark of cypress wood; make rooms in it and coat it with pitch inside and out.

Blog, now here is something interesting : 7:6 Noah was six hundred years old when the flood waters came on the earth. 7 And Noah and his sons and his wife and his sons' wives entered the ark to escape the waters of the flood. That's a good hundred years later! Obviously 1 old man and 3 younger men (with their wives) cannot build such a huge craft in a day, a week, nor even a month. Werent thier neighbours curious? 

So here I see God giving everyone who cared to ask, a chance to escape the flood by changing their ways and putting their faith in God...No, Blog, I don't think God was an alien to them, nor did they have a hundred different representations of Him. After all, they were direct descendants of Adam and just 10 generations apart. With most of them living for 900 years each to see their great grandchildren and more maybe, and God still speaking to men directly, they couldnt have been ignorant of Him. 

  Lets move on: Noah obeys, enters, and God said: 7:4 Seven days from now I will send rain on the earth for forty days and forty nights" Now, that's Faith for you. In vs 16, you can see it says,16 The animals going in were male and female of every living thing, as God had commanded Noah. Then the LORD shut him in. And I guess that must be true, since the door had to be pretty big, too big for Noah to close on his own. Anyway, I can see his neighbours who till then had thought him and family 'strange' and had ignored his building works, now would probably be curious. Word spread like wild fire - "The Crazy guy's got locked in!" They might have knocked, then shouted, then as neither side could open the door, decided to leave Noah and his family be, or maybe they taunted him...7 Days later,...10 And after the seven days the floodwaters came on the earth.11 In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, on the seventeenth day of the second month--on that day all the springs of the great deep burst forth, and the floodgates of the heavens were opened.12 And rain fell on the earth forty days and forty nights.

Now Blog, we know with God in action, we dont doubt that it rained for 40 days and 40 nights, but ever wonder where all that water came from? Lets do a flash back to creation of the world:
genesis 1: 6 And God said, "Let there be an expanse between the waters to separate water from water." 7 So God made the expanse and separated the water under the expanse from the water above it. And it was so.  There was a ceiling of water above! So the humidity on the surface of the planet was high, high enough to cause a heavy dew:  Genesis 2:5 And every ^aplant of the field ^bbefore it was in the ^cearth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the Lord God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a ^dman to till the ^eground.
 6 But there went up a ^amist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.

Yes! You got it,Blog! Noah's neighbours did not believe him that it would rain, cos they..had...NOT...seen...rain! They could not believe that water would fall from the sky! Bbut neither had Noah, nor his family.

Yes, that is faith, Blog...Hope in things unseen.

Then the rest of it we know, the floods rose, it rained for 40 days and 40 nights, and Genesis 7: 24, The waters flooded the earth for a hundred and fifty days. Genesis 8:3 The water receded steadily from the earth. At the end of the hundred and fifty days the water had gone down, 4 and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month the ark came to rest on the mountains of Ararat.5 The waters continued to recede until the tenth month, and on the first day of the tenth month the tops of the mountains became visible.6 After forty days Noah opened the window he had made in the ark. 7and sent out a raven, and it kept flying back and forth until the water had dried up from the earth. 13 By the first day of the first month of Noah's six hundred and first year, the water had dried up from the earth. Noah then removed the covering from the ark and saw that the surface of the ground was dry.14 By the twenty-seventh day of the second month the earth was completely dry.

So that means, Noah was in the Ark was 1 year and 2 months!

So Blog, that is the truth behind Noah and his ark...Rock monsters? Ahh, that is a tale for another day...

Was the Pope misrepresented/ misquoted?

http://entertainment.vacancynigerians.com/2013/12/shocking-there-is-no-hell-fire-adam-eve.html

Shocking: There Is No Hell Fire; Adam & Eve Not Real ––– Pope Francis Exposes

Seriously?! 
             Blog, this cant be true, not the Pope. I'm sure someone must be misrepresenting him and misquoting the man who holds the lives and future of millions in his hands. A single word from him will be accepted by his followers as a divine revelation. That said, it is inconceivable that he of all people would disregard the original divine Word, the holy text that he has sworn to follow and uphold all his life, the Bible that is the very core of his being and the guide for his every breath.      
          No, blog, it cant be true that the latest Pope should suddenly upturn the beliefs and teachings of the very Church he represents. he is quoted as stating - "God is changing and evolving as we are,..." I'm sure he can quote the scriptures better than me, Blog, so whoever scripted his speech has forgotten that the Pope knows Numbers 23:19 - God is not a human being, that he should lie, or a mortal, that he should change his mind." 
          And I know for sure the Pope remembers I Samuel 15: 29 - He who is the Glory of Israel does not lie or change his mind, for He is not Man, that He should change His mind."
 So how can an unchangeable God, 'evolve' with us?

                 If God has sworn that the penalty for sin is death, then it is. But, because He loved the world so much, he couldn't bear that all us sinful people should face eternal Death, then He, in His great love for us, will make a way out for us...but NOT by 'evolving 'with us, and joining us in our madness. If God is going change with us, then Blog, what security do we have? 
             No, the Way out, had to be a sacrifice, (and I think, all religions will agree with me on this, that a sacrifice is always required, someway or the other). I agree with the Pope here when he said "“All religions are true,..."       
            And the Pope knows the Bible says that Jesus was the perfect and only sacrifice acceptable to God, (  Romans 3: 24 onwards  - they are now justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, ²⁵whom God put forward as a sacrifice of atonement^* by his blood, effective through faith. He did this to show his righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over the sins previously committed; ²⁶it was to prove at the present time that he himself is righteous and that he justifies the one who has faith in Jesus.^*)

       So Blog, we know that God cannot change, and that He loves us unconditionally, with no distinctions of race, creed, caste or the bad choices we may make in life, and His way out of our spiraling madness, confusion, chaos and 'building walls between ourselves', is Jesus, and the Pope knows this.

   

David's Testimony...

Dear Blog,
remember David, my son, who was given just 4 hrs more to live when he was 10 days old 'cos of multiple organ failure? Well, he would like to share something with you now...23 years later.

   " It started 7 years ago, when I was in 12th std and had just joined Animation classes. I guess it was the long hours of sitting in front of the computer that started the migraine headaches, but it went on for quite sometime, even after I completed the course.
     Days went by... weeks, and months turned into years, and still the headache. Bright light always triggered it off and I couldnt find any healing for it. The pain was getting worse but the ophthalmologist couldn't find anything wrong, so they referred me to a neurologist. The pills he prescribed could have turned me blind as it shouldn't have been recommended for glaucoma - thank God we found out in time and stopped them! I decided to just trust the Lord to heal me.
        On some days (and it may be daily) the pain would be so bad I had to rest for hours with my eyes closed (even in the office) till the pain left. There were days when I would pray, wondering when my healing would come and I was comforted by a passage in the Bible where Daniel prayed to God for a long time, but didn't get any answer. Then Michael, an angel of the Lord,  came to Daniel and told him that he had to fight the Prince of Persia (the ruling spirit of the land) and the persistent prayers of Daniel was the only thing that helped Michael defeat the enemy.
        I held on to that and continued to pray and praise God for my healing that flows from the Throne Room of Grace. Day after day I prayed, believing that I was healed by faith. Until one day, a small still voice told me to start listening to Gospel music and I did. I repeated the songs over and over and I felt such peace; I knew I was healed.
   I realised that I could walk in to sudden bright sunshine and not get a headache. Its been 2 months now. Praise the Lord for healing me."
                                                                                          David M.S.

   Blog, isn't He wonderful? David's life itself is a wonderful account of God's faithfulness....and that's a story for another time.
         

Spirituality and Natural calamities.

Dear Blog,
   A post on FB ( http://www.americaneedsfatima.org/Articles/elephants-attack-in-orissa.html) and the subsequent comments got me thinking.

   The most basic fact we cannot ignore here is : Man's attempts at connecting  with spirits (simply summed up as spirituality) will ultimately have an effect on the Natural realm.We cannot disconnect the two.

   So, what do we do with this fact? .
Lets go back in history a bit first, Blog. To say that God loved Mankind so much He sent His son to die for us, then to turn around and accuse Him of causing deaths through natural calamities, is illogical. Where is the loving God we want to connect with?
So, here is what I have found: Since Jesus came to defeat the work of Darkness, there is a force we have to be aware of which will is not working in our favour, and Jesus is obviously not the force of Darkness.

 Jesus defeated Death through His resurrection - so what, you ask? What has that got to do with us, or better still, how will that help us?
   It cant actually, that fact is completely useless to all human being who are headed for death anyway. UNLESS - yes, unless, we tap into Jesus's sacrifice, and make His victory, our victory. To tap into all that He fought to get for us - healing, peace, prosperity, success, joy...in short, a life in abundance. Blog, have you seen the movie, The Passion? You'll get a glimpse...

So where does that connect to Natural calamities, you ask. Hmm, good question.
See, when you have tapped into all that Jesus fought for you to have, He calls you, the SALT of the earth...salt adds taste, salt brings healing, and salt helps preserve..Yes, I know that many of us who claim to belong to Him are pretty tasteless, and that puts off others...a pretty sad state of affairs. And where we should be praying for and bringing in His healing...well, thats a point of further discussion, Blog.

But - and this is the most exciting part - salt preserves! Wherever, we are, we are a kind of preservative, pockets of safety, our presence creates an umbrella for His grace to come through, a reason for our neighbours to prosper and keep the peace. When we are removed from the picture, the region is exposed, vulnerable to the forces of Darkness...and so we have terrible calamities happening. Darkness had been defeated by the work of the cross, but, he still rules this earth (through Adam),and will continue to do so, till Jesus returns...

So Blog, Jesus does not create calamities...

Getting a driver's license...

Dear Blog,
  I must tell you about a day at the RTO (Road Transport Office).
 Went with someone to get their driver's license. First of course, we had to present ourselves at the office of the driving instructor at 9.30am sharp, who merely directed us off to the RTO on our own. You must have heard of the notorious 'table -to table' pilgrimage anyone has to do at an govt office? Well this time it wasn't so bad...we got all done in nearly an hour; paid the fees, got the mandatory, thumb print, photos etc...now all we had to do was to clear the practical test.
  An hour later, we were still waiting....2 hours goes...waiting. By now, having to stand (no place to sit) was taking a toll so we snuck out for a 15 min break, hoping our place in the queue wouldnt go, nor that the examiner would come in between.
 Came back in a hurry. Everyone, still waiting...1 hour later...They ask us to move to another place, on the opposite side of the building for the test. Yeah! We rush...all queue positions gone, every man for himself!
  Our driving instructor is there, but avoids speaking to us. Huh. We start asking around - what is the matter? When will the test start?  Someone said, the examiner is not happy, expects our instructor to 'make his pocket heavier'...But the students don't know for sure.

 Ok, so we wait...and wait...Dear Blog, do you know frustrating it is to just wait...doing nothing? It is more tiring than if we were to be always on the move.

The sun has started moving over to the other side of the planet by now...Our instructor is walking over to us! We jump up from the foot path / stone bench / fence where ever we had found temporary rest, and move to him eagerly. He says" Examiner has left for the day."  !!!  "But there is another guy who will do the test, come to the park." I would have given him a piece of my mind, if I wasnt worried that it might spoil our chances..Ok, so we jump into our vehicles and go to the park.

Here, yeah, there is a Testing Car, so it looks real, so I think, maybe we are at the end of the wait. 2 students at a time, are pushed into the car, one at the back, one at the front, with the instructor and the examiner... The car jerks forward as the first nervous student puts it into gear, and they are off. Barely 3 mins later, the car comes from the other end of the road, with the second student at the wheel. Thats it, test over!
 And we waited nearly 5 hours for this!!!

NO Dear Blog, this is not the end of our wait. We had to wait for everyone to finish, then were asked to hand over Rs 500 each, to the instructor. "Where do we get the receipt?" I ask..stupid question.
He glares at me...Where did this dumb lady come from? "No receipt. This is for the test."
Ooooooh, I seee...

Then as if it explains everything, he says, "the license will come in the post."

Thank goodness its all over, Blog.

Choices at 50.

Dear Blog,
   You know we have planning to meet for some time now, but it just didn't happen. So why now, you say? well I just needed to talk to someone, and I guess you'r the best listener.
 So what do we talk about?
The trip to Conoor. But then, I wonder, if I put these thoughts into words for you, will they become more of a reality to me? Will they define the way I will perceive the future? I guess thats another reason why we didnt meet earlier either - not to define thoughts and encase then in a tomb of words.
So, do I tell you about the coming trip or not?To start with, why am I going on this trip at all?
 I have just turned 50! yeah, half a century of walking on this earth and using its resources.
 What do I feel about that?
Humbled, I guess, and conscious of Time.Also, looking back, I realise that the path I have walked  and the choices I had made made may not have been the best, but they've shaped me. I am harder, more suspicious, less trusting...Did you know that someone once told me that my name translated to "trusting' and that it was a very dangerous character to have in this world. I guess he was right.
So how come this trip?
Well, now that I'm 50, I want to do things for myself, before I am too old to do anything else. I had hoped that I would travel, see places, do things, explore possibilities and spread my wings, to stretch beyond my limitations. but now I'm 50, and I wonder...where did Time go? Bad choices; wasted time, limited goals, and folded wings. But who cares? If I wait any longer for my Choices to support me, then I am wasting even more time. Time is life, they say, and wasted Time is a wasted life.
Am I cribbing then?
Yes, I guess. But now that I have put them down in words, I guess I could shake them off and move on. So this trip to Conoor is the first step of independence and self discovery (even if my daughter is coming along).

Where were you when they crucified my lord? (In a Bubble of Time.)

“Then why didn’t you?”  John stepped in. “I’ll tell you why; because you believed the Master. We all did.... That's why we chose to stay.”

“But what good has that done us now, boy?” Matthew who had been brooding in silence now joined in. “We left all to follow him. And now he is dead. I don’t even know if I have a profession to go back to. It’ll be easier for you, Sons of Zebedee; your father will allow you back into his boat. But will the authorities re-employ me?  I am considered a rebel, along with the Master. I cannot hold another public office. I have given away much of my wealth - that which I had saved before I met the Master - I have nothing to go back to, no security.

“No future” he moaned. “Don’t look at me like that; think of yourselves,” he said sharply, “what have you go to go back to?  Will our lives ever be the same again? And for what?” with that, he lapsed back into his dark silence. And infectious silence. The others looked at each other.

“The Master promised us much.... In his kingdom we would have had a hundred times as much of all that we have given up - and eternal life in the age to come.” John remembered.

“What will your mother say to that now, John?” Simon the Zealot asked, watching as the younger man cringed in embarrassment.

“Leave him alone,” Andrew warned.

“Do you still want to sit, one on the Master’s right and the other on his left?” Simon taunted, encouraged by the others’ laughter.

“We weren’t the only ones who wanted a position in his kingdom,” John defended, angry, “you were all equally interested or you wouldn’t have been arguing about who was the greatest. What did you expect to be, Simon? Commander in chief of his army?”

Simon sprang to his feet, his dagger drawn. He had always carried it with him though well concealed from the Master. Simon knew Jesus wouldn’t have approved of his physical violence. He had almost used it at the Garden but skillful as he was with it, he knew he was no match alone against the soldiers, their swords and the Pharisees and their sticks and clubs and slaves. He had put it out of sight again then, and had regretted it ever since. He should have tried, done something. Given Jesus a chance to escape; at least he could have died trying. His moment of cowardice would always haunt him and now it goaded him into drawing it against the fisherman.

There was a gasp from the others as John got to his feet too. Simeon hoped he wouldn’t have to use it. He wished he hadn’t been so rash but he wasn’t going to be a coward a second time.

John, Son of Thunder, faced him. John’s eyes blazed. There was no fear in them. He who had wanted fire from heaven to come down and burn up a whole Samaritan village in his anger, now was itching for a fight. All the pent up anger and pain at having to stand by and watch helplessly as his friend had died - was now seeking release.

It was to John as if he had been in agony too. Yet he hadn’t been able to leave the foot of the cross. Couldn't leave Jesus. And in the darkness that had strangely enveloped the land, John had stood vigil in the flickering torch light. With nothing else to do, he had remembered. Remembered other days when he had leaned on those shoulders now stretched out so cruelly. Those hands that had reached out to those no one else would; picked up those children who couldn’t walk his pace and yet who wanted to walk the distance with him. Jesus.....

John had heard Peter’s declaration to the Master that he, Jesus, was the Son of God, and John, in his heart had believed it too.

Those hands that had flung the stars across the sky, shaped the mountains, painted the wings of a butterfly, now were outstretched, bleeding. Why didn’t he unleash his power?  What kept it in check, why was he allowing Man, whom He had created, to humiliate Him?

John couldn’t understand it. Couldn't accept that Jesus’ death was part of some great, mysterious plan of God. What good could possibly come out of it?

And young John, had allowed himself to cry. Who would notice anyway?  Who cared?

And now these men talked. Where had they been, he would have liked to ask. It was only his love for Jesus that had kept a control on his tongue. He had to force himself to remember that Jesus had loved them too. So for his master’s sake.....Till now.

But Simon had goaded him beyond control.

 “Oh stop it, the both of you.” Matthew commanded. “Start a fight and you won’t have to wait in suspense for the authorities to arrest you. Now sit down! And calm down. There is nothing to be done till the Sabbath is over. The Master is dead; The Kingdom is never to be - at least not in this generation and we had all better be thinking of our future plans.”

The moment was diffused. Simon put away the weapon and sat down. Cautiously, John did too, but never taking his eyes off the other man. It had taken him by surprise and he wasn’t sure if Simon could be trusted again. The others too shifted nervously, sure of only one fact - something was happening to what they had always thought was an unbreakable bond between them - a brotherhood - more than mere blood-ties between natural siblings; they were falling apart, coming undone at the seams. Their common thread, it was now obvious, had been Jesus.

____l-----------l___

“Mary, Susanna and I are waiting out the Sabbath. But where were you when the Master needed you?  Where was your loyalty to your ‘King?  You ran away when they arrested him in the Garden, and have been hiding ever since. You,” Joanna's pointed finger swept over the men. “You weren’t there when they brought him out to Herod. If your loyalty to him was as you boast, that was when you should have tried to free him. The people were all there - your loyal subjects. They had seen the signs and miracles - they would have followed you, surely.

“You fought over who was the greatest, who should sit at the Master’s right hand, but which one of your tried to set him free?  What happened to the Promises of the Kingdom?  Wasn’t it enough to prompt you to defend your king?  And you were expecting to be ministers in his kingdom?  Matthew, you a High Priest, maybe?  Being of the lineage of Levi?” her tone, scathing.

“Where were you, ‘soldiers of Christ’, when they brought him out bloodied and torn?-   his eyes trying to blink away the blood that ran down his forehead and caked on his lashes?  Did you wipe them away for him?  Did you help him to carry that heavy crossbeam?  Did you help him to ease its load, lift its rough wood off his back and shoulders where it rubbed into his torn and tattered back?  Did you even see it?  His flesh was ripped to ribbons where the bones on the whips’ tips had dug in.” She took in a deep, shuddering breath, trying to control her voice through the threat of tears..

“Bartholomew”, her anger had not yet abated, “you have moaned and grumbled . Where were you when Jesus stumbled on the stones, his legs weak; did you pick him up, steady him?  Did you try to offer him a cup of water?  Did you notice how parched his lips were?”  Her tears flowed freely,  “How…  How dare any of you even think of how much you have lost!. What have you lost?  Jesus gave you the best three years of your lives but he lost his life. What have you ever done for him, that you should boast?”

“Where were you when they crucified my lord?” she beat her chest with a bunched fist, her agony evident. Joanna stood there trembling, her eyes blazing with fury, with frustration at the disciples, at the unjust authorities, at her own great loss.

She finally sat down, her legs weak. She sat close to Mary, and put an arm around her friend who was yet to say a word. Surely Mary’s loss was much greater.

The men looked sheepish, uncomfortable. 
The knock on the door made them all jump.The knock repeated, persistent, authoritatively.

Simeon drew his dagger out and moved forward cautiously.

“Don’t.”  Suzanah pushed him aside. “I’ll open the door. We don’t know who it is. It may not be trouble.”  but she didn’t sound convincing, even to herself.

She lifted the latch, and opened the door a fraction; Simeon hid directly behind it, ready to pounce at the first sign of danger.