Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Even though my heart is still stirred whenever I read anything remotely related to the Restitution of All Things, over the past few years I’ve resisted the temptation to join in because of time constraints.
As you well know, this stuff can really consume a lot of time. When I was told about this forum and started reading the dialog, again, I remembered how much those early days of discovery, debate, and hours of discussion over the internet helped to strengthen my walk and build my faith. You, Birdy, and others, where a tremendous encouragement at a time when I couldn’t find much moral support from anyone, especially my church friends and theological eggheads. You were not soon forgotten and I owe you guys a debt of gratitude. I must say that, today, I have multiple friends, family, and “eggheads”, that I fellowship around the “Greater Hope” (as Thomas Allin described it), on a regular basis. God is good!
I love how this exteme love message can get under our theological skin. We all need a place like this to expose what we really believe and why we believe it. The greatest difficulty is to consider the possibility that we might not have all the answers. I was the worst offender, the longer someone has been stooped in religious dogmas the more bond we become; and the more difficult it is to expand our relationship with God. As we limit God’s love we limit our own potential to love. If we really believe that God’s patience will one day find its limit and his need for vengeance is no longer covered by his sacrifice, or constrained by his love, then we, too, will be motivated by fear and act accordingly.
Writing has a way of clearing my head and codifying my thoughts and I realize that I may need this form of encouragement, again, especially in these days. Please allow me to slip in a comment or two in the future and if I disappear I’m sure I’ll return like a bad penny.
I once vowed to the Living One, over 20 years ago, that I would not disclose to any one what He spoke deep into my spirit with six little words, that have since been a minefield of glory. I cannot help myself, I am addicted: every morning the day begins with the addiction, and ends with the prayer of Jesus Christ the Lord of glory, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Let the groaning of the slaves of sin be ended!
Mhz: my brother I thank God for your voice, and the song of the Spirit of the Lord singing in antiphonal worship to those who have ears to hear. One glad day the dumbest of the dumb shall hear & join the Symphony of the ages!
"The Lord appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee" or, as the margin gives the alternative rendering, "therefore have I continued lovingkindness unto thee" (Jer. 31:3).
That is one of the most astounding statements that has ever been made. To verify that, to realize something of that fact, you need to read all that leads up to it and that follows afterward. That is to say, you need to read the prophecies of Jeremiah throughout, and then to add to them some of the prophecies of other prophets. For the work of the prophet was very largely to point out how far, how terribly and tragically far, those being addressed had gone from God's mind, God's thought, God's will, God's way, and in what a terrible state of hardness of heart and rebellion - and worse than that - they were toward God. All that - and it is a terrible and dark story - gathers round this statement. "I have loved thee." At the time when they were in the very worst condition that ever they had been or would be in spiritually and morally, it was then He said "I have loved thee with an everlasting love." Viewed in its setting, you must agree it is one of the most amazing statements ever made.
"His great love wherewith he loved us."
We are baffled and almost rendered silent when we try to fathom and comprehend the word "grace" in reference to the love of God. How great is God's love? Were we to spend our lives trying, we could never utter its depth or content. Yet here is a statement, and we have to do something about it. We have to approach it, to try to grasp something, be it very small, of this incomprehensible love of God, the mystery of it. So I shall adopt the very simplest method of trying to get into this word, just breaking up the statement into its component words.
Chapter 1 - The Creation Motivated by the Love of God
'I have loved thee with an everlasting love.' You can never translate that word "everlasting" into English. It simply means that you have got into the spaceless, boundless realm, you have fallen out of time to where time is no more. You have gone out into that mysterious something where nothing can be taken hold of as tangible, it is all beyond you, beyond your grasp, beyond your calculation, beyond your power to cope with it and bring it into some kind of dimensions. That is the word: beyond you, beyond your time, beyond your world, beyond all your ways of thinking and working. 'I have loved thee with an everlasting, timeless, spaceless love.' Did you notice the alternative marginal reading to the phrase? 'Jehovah appeared of old unto me'? It is, 'from afar appeared unto me' - outside of our world altogether. He says, 'I have loved you with a love altogether outside your dimensions of time and space.'
Shana: How could we forget to count you in? Do you know who penned these words?
Savior, Whom our hearts adore,
To bless our earth again,
Now assume Thy royal power,
And o'er the nations reign;
Christ, the world's Desire and Hope,
Power complete to Thee is given;
Set the last great empire up,
Eternal Lord of Heaven.
Where they all Thy laws have spurned,
Where they Thy Name profane,
Where the ruined world hath mourned
With blood of millions slain,
Open there the ethereal scene,
Claim the heathen tribes for Thine;
There the endless reign begin
With majesty divine.
Universal Savior, Thou
Wilt all Thy creatures bless;
Every knee to Thee shall bow,
And every tongue confess:
None shall in Thy mount destroy;
War shall then be learnt no more:
Saints shall their great King enjoy,
And all mankind adore.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
