OUR LORD WHO WATCHES OVER US

The LORD is your keeper; The LORD is your shade on your right hand.

 The sun will not smite you by day, Nor the moon by night. The LORD will protect you from all evil; He will keep your soul.

The LORD will guard your going out and your coming in From this time forth and forever.

This astonishing passage out of Psalm 121 verse 5 - 8, gives us a picture of the Lord's committed watch over those who look to Him for help. He guards us continually and eternally. 

Our every motion is before Him and at every turn, the Lord protects us and keeps us. 

Whereas we humans sometimes ask Cain's famous question, "Am I my brother's keeper", the Lord our God instead, wholeheartedly gives Himself to the protection and guardianship over those to turn to Him for help.

Psalm 32 verse 8 says this;

I will instruct you and teach you in the way which you should go; I will counsel you with My eye upon you.

Part of the Lord's care us is that He teaches us and guides us in the path we should follow and because His eye watches over us, His knowledge of us is exhaustive and His counsel for us is precisely tailored to each of us.

Bless our Lord who watches over us.

Amen.

Refetence reource: https://bible.knowing-jesus.com/

OUR LORD WHO RESISTS THE PROUD

The fourth verse of the  book of Obadiah says this;

Though you soar like the eagle and make your nest among the stars, from there I will bring you down,” declares the Lord.

This declaration by the Lord  is directed at Satan when he deigned to ascend  to the heights of heaven to take administrative and political control over creation. 

Even though Satan, from his lofty perch, thought He was beyond reach, the Lord God Almighty did in fact reach him and cast him down in an event that Jesus Himself witnessed and described this way in Luke 10 verse 19;

And He said to them, “I was watching Satan fall from heaven like lightning.

In the same way, any men who become haughty enough to see themselves as having the power of judgement over all of humanity seeing them as poor and therefore beneath them, should know that “God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” as it says in James chapter 4 verse 6.

Any man, arising in fraternity with the kingdom of darkness and claiming for himself authority over the earth that he did not create and that he does not sustain, the Lord shall oppose him and he shall be cast down for  Jeremiah 50 verse 31 says; “Behold, I am against you, O arrogant one, Declares the Lord God of hosts, “For your day has come, The time when I will punish you.

Let us thank the Lord for His great salvation from the proud who, at the behest of the kingdom of darkness, try to rise above us to oppress us.

Amen.

Reference resource: bible.knowing-jesus.com/

OUR LORD WHO DISSOLVES EVIL PLANS

Isaiah 19 verse 3 says this;

The Egyptians will lose heart, and I will bring their plans to nothing; they will consult the idols and the spirits of the dead, the mediums and the spiritists.

Following on from yesterday's reading in the same chapter, we see here that the effect of God's intervention against Egypt's plans to oppress God's people is that the Egyptians lose heart. They become completely discouraged as their plots and schemes dissolve to nothing. 

In a desperate attempt to reverse their collapsing fortunes, they consult with mediums and spiritist to get guidance on how to overpower the opposition that is undermining them.

The attempt to gain spiritual leverage, however, has the opposite effect. 

As the next verse Isaiah 19 verse 4 says;

I will hand the Egyptians over to the power of a cruel master, and a fierce king will rule over them,” declares the Lord, the Lord Almighty.

Rather than gain leverage in the spiritual realm, the Egyptians were consigned to a fierce oppressor who cruelly ruled over them because the Egyptian rulers had foolishly made a faustian bargain.

Let us thank our Lord for His intervention in the spiritual realm to save us from oppression and let us be cautioned to never consult with voices that speak from the kingdom of darkness lest we invite a strong man into our midst from whom escape is difficult.

Amen.

OUR LORD WHO DISCOMBOBULATES HIS FOES

Continuing from yesterday's reading, let's look at Isaiah  19 verse 14. Verse 13 and verse 15 are read for context.

The officials of Zoan have become fools, the leaders of Memphis are deceived; the cornerstones of her peoples have led Egypt astray.

The Lord has poured into them a spirit of dizziness; they make Egypt stagger in all that she does, as a drunkard staggers around in his vomit.

There is nothing Egypt can do—head or tail, palm branch or reed.

The Egyptians, as they seek to establish their power to oppress God's people, are afflicted by the Lord with a spirit of dizziness or disorientation. 

The Lord pours disequilibrium on the leaders and the counsel of the regime causing the whole nation of Egypt to stagger and lurch from one irrational position to the other completely unable to take any concrete actions.

The confusion causes the state of Egypt to act like a drunkard, reeling and slipping around in his vomit. 

This is an unseemly image for sure but it clearly illustrates the effect that God's countermeasure has against the aggressive and oppressive regime of Egypt. 

The Egyptians hautily claim for themselves authorities they are not allotted and the Lord resists them by removing their capacity to reason intelligently and they collapse into the quagmire of their own making.

Let us humbly thank the Lord for his mercy on us and His intervention to deliver us from those who would oppress us.

Amen.

OUR LORD WHO CONFOUNDS THE WISE

Isaiah 19 verse 12 - 14 says this about the oppressive powers of Egypt when they sought to crush the Lord's people;

Where are your wise men now? Let them show you and make known what the Lord Almighty has planned against Egypt.

The officials of Zoan have become fools, the leaders of Memphis are deceived; the cornerstones of her peoples have led Egypt astray.

The Lord has poured into them a spirit of dizziness; they make Egypt stagger in all that she does, as a drunkard staggers around in his vomit.

Those who were charged with planning the actions of Egypt's oppressive regime lost their ability to reason. They became foolish and delusional. The bad decisions and advise they offered to the leaders of the regime led them hopelessly astray.

In defense of His people, the Lord will confound those who attempt to harm His inheritance.

Bless the Lord our God who intervenes to save His people.

Amen.

OUR LORD WHO RESTORES OUR SOULS

One of the most famous passages from the bible is found in Psalm 23.  The New King James rendition is the most familiar and the first three verses go like this;

1- The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

2- He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.

3- He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.

When we accept the Lord as our shepherd, we are brought into His fold and our focus is on the things of His Kingdom and by His grace, He undertakes to take care of all that we have need of.

He makes us lie down in green pastures which means that He gives us rest and because we are surrounded by provisions, we are assured of his care for us and thus we are not worried or anxious about anything.

He leads us beside still waters which means that Jesus provides water to refresh us that we would no longer thirst. The still waters also symbolize that He stills the turbulence in our hearts so that our souls can be still and quiet before Him. In this hushed condition, we can hear His still small voice as He comforts us and guides us. The still waters are also reflecting pools where we are  invited to truly see ourselves the way He sees us and understand the purpose for which we were made.

While we are in this repose, Jesus restores our souls from the injuries, traumas, pollutants, toxins and evils deeds we encounter  that  bring structural damage to the spaces of our souls. 

The delicate work of the reconstruction of the ruined portions of our souls  involves a complex mix of revivication, stitching, rescusitation  and inner healing  to return our souls to their original design specifications.

Our Lord Jesus, the good shepherd, patiently and kindly mends our souls when we learn to trust him and commit ourselves to Him.

With restored souls, Jesus is better able to lead us in paths of righteousness for His name's sake so we should look for every opportunity to quieten ourselves before Him so he can make us lie down in green pastures and lead us besides still waters where he can do the work of restoring our souls.

As Psalm 103 verse 1 says, Bless the Lord O my soul and all that is within me bless His holy name.

Amen.

OUR LORD BY WHOM ALL THINGS WERE MADE

Refering to Jesus as the Word who was in the beginning with God and was God, John 1 verse 3 also says this about Jesus:

Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 

This exceptional assertion is one of the most profound in a book of profound assertions.

Jesus, who walked the dusty roads of Nazareth and who had brothers and sisters among  us, is the one by whom all things that are made were made.

Yes...that Jesus, the man who, at the graveside of His friend, openly wept in our midst and who chatted cheerfully with the Syro-phoenician woman about whether the scope of His mission included her or not and who diverted His  team of diciples across a stormy lake  to find and bring deliverance to a demonized castaway who ran naked among graves stones cutting his own  arms with rocks and who was offered all the kingdoms of the world for the easy price of bowing down to Satan but instead chose to gain  all the kingdoms of the world by paying for them with His own shed blood and agonized death by a brutal crucifixion and who faced judgement in hell where a single flaw in Him would have doomed Him forever but who, in His immaculately clean conscience, knew that Satan had nothing on Him and when the glory commensurate with his righteousness broke forth in brilliant light,  the powers of darkness were made a public spectacle from which they never recovered  and who rose again from the dead and ascended to the right hand of God the Father where He was crowned the King of the creation that was made by Him and through Him and for Him.

Who is this King of Glory?  Psalm 24 verse 10 gives the answer;

Who is he, this King of glory? The Lord Almighty—he is the King of glory.

Amen.