Dale offers the prompt “in bloom” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
The flowers above are bougainvillea in Florida.
The flowers below are poppies in Illinois.
They were both taken around late winter or early spring although some years ago.
Hereby know we that we dwell in him, and he in us, because he hath given us of his Spirit.
1 John 4:13 King James Version
David Pawson asked in the lecture below (about 12:00) why are believers so certain they are saved?
Is the basis for our assurance the Scriptures? Not completely. The Scriptures are too objective. Pawson explained, “It says there that whoever believes is certain of Heaven, but how do I know I am included?” (about 13:50)
Is the basis for our certainty our holiness? Again, not completely. Our holiness is too subjective. Pawson explained, “If my assurance is based on my living a Christ-like life in the world, then frankly I am going to be beset by a nagging doubt again, because there are times that I know that I have not lived a Christ-like life.” (about 15:30)
Where then do we find assurance? Pawson answered: “The thing that clinches it every time is neither the Scripture nor your own sanctity, but the Spirit.” (about 17:10) Through our mouths the Spirit overflows as we testify that Jesus is Lord and God is Father. That overflow with joy is our certainty.
If we can make that testimony with our mouths, then we have all we need for the gift of tongues. This gift allows us to pray to God in languages we do not understand which keeps our minds from getting in the way. We do this privately for personal edification. That prayer is between ourselves and God.
How do we do it? Breathe in. Open the mouth. Move the lips and tongue and make sounds even if they are very quiet, under one’s breath. Trust the Spirit will come up with the perfect words of prayer and praise in agreement with the Father’s will and not our own.
Someone might complain that anyone, even those without the Spirit, could fake praying in tongues if they wanted to. True. They could, if they wanted to, but who in their right mind would want to do that for very long without the joy, thanks and praise coming from the Holy Spirit?
Nor does this mean that one must pray in tongues if one has the Spirit. It’s a privilege. One gets to do this for long periods of time if one wants to. When some demon is messing with your mind trying to push you over a cliff of anger, lust or self-centeredness or whatever, start praying in tongues. The demon won’t have a clue what you’re saying. Then send that demon over the cliff if it hasn’t already jumped.
Your body has become a temple of the Holy Spirit.
For more information on praying in tongues see Dave Roberson’s free pdf book, The Walk of the Spirit – The Walk of Power: The Vital Role of Praying in Tongues. This post is about what he referred to as “tongues for personal edification” in Chapter 5. Another useful resource is by Mahesh Chavda, The Hidden Power of Speaking in Tongues. Andrew Wommack explains how praying in tongues is done in his final lecture of the series How To Hear God’s Voice. To put this all in perspective, Ryan Reeves presents a general, historical overview of Pentacostalism.
Not all Christians accept praying in tongues. Indeed, I suspect most don’t, but I also suspect with the growth of Pentecostalism that will change. For example, John MacArthur rejected tongues because he claimed it is easy to falsify and Greg Bahnsen made a theological claim that tongues have ceased. However, I find praying in tongues to be an effective exercise that keeps my heart on the Lord and strengthens my faith.
You are welcome to express your own views in the comments below.
Weekly Parashah Readings
Parashah: Metzora 8 Nissan, 5782 – April 9, 2022
Torah: Leviticus 14:1 – 15:33
Haftarah: Kings II 7:3-20
Brit Chadashah: Matthew 8:1-17
Resources: Chabad, Hebrew4Christians, Weekly Torah Readings, Calendar
Busy folk in the city paid no attention to the clouds splashing through the sky. The clouds got darker. They dropped thick, beautiful snow. The busy folk couldn’t get to work. The snow was so deep the snow plow driver didn’t see the sign to raise the plow in time. That made a mess.
People blamed the politicians who promised global warming. The politicians blamed the scientists. The scientists blamed Gaia. Since Gaia doesn’t exist, she couldn’t care less.
The clouds couldn’t care less either, because that’s not what clouds do. They splash through the sky dropping rain and snow.
Eugenia offers “splashy” for this week’s prompt. Rochelle Wisoff-Fields offers the photo below for her Friday Fictioneers prompt. With thanks to Oneta Hayes for reminding me of Friday Fictioneers.
I am grateful to the editor, Sammi Cox, for accepting this story for Whispers and Echoes.
Thomas enjoyed an ability to run off the neighborhood kids by just looking at them, but even he was surprised that Moshe’s one year old daughter was old enough to have the sense to start crying when their eyes met. Unfortunately not only was the girl precocious, but the memory of her eyes acted on Thomas like a match lighting up horrendous nightmares.
When Thomas was finally too afraid to go to sleep and ready to try anything he sought Moshe’s advice complaining about his dreams. With Thomas’s permission Moshe commanded, “All you demons influencing, tormenting, terrorizing or generally messing with my neighbor, Thomas, – LEAVE HIM – BaShem Yeshua HaMashiach!” Thomas fell to the ground screaming out demons like vomit.
After the demons left Moshe helped Thomas to his feet and explained to him the changes he would have to make to keep them from returning with reinforcements.
Denise offers the prompt word “match” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories. This is a continuation from Harmony – Six Sentence Story.
Mark 16:17, “And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues;” (KJV)
Dale offers the prompt “from an interesting angle” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
In the photo above of the trail, I knelt down to get a different view of the railings. This was taken many years ago on the Barr Trail in Manitou Springs, Colorado.
In the photo below I pretended I was a pigeon. I got down very low and focused on the ground. This was also taken many years ago somewhere in Europe.
And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
Genesis 2:7 King James Version
Bob Sorensen used the phrase “dust-to-Darwin” to describe evolution. This phrase succinctly describes the mythopoetic rationalization underlying evolutionary speculations. It brings two contrary things to mind. First, the word dust brings to mind Genesis 2:7 where we have a “dust-to-Adam” creation by God. Second, the word Darwin brings to mind those who promote a mindless, deterministic/random evolutionary explanation of how we got here.
The dust-to-Darwin problem is the realization that the speculations attempting to replace Genesis are no longer plausible, if they ever were. The problem for atheistic speculations is that science never has been on the side of atheism in spite of it being institutionally force-fed. That’s because experimental science doesn’t sit still. Scientists, some of them witlessly, keep pushing down the atheist fencing, because that fencing doesn’t fit reality.
For example, although mutations in DNA might look like the driving force of evolution, look closer and they point to genetic entropy and single, recent male and female ancestors. Although the fossil column might look like it could be dated to be hundreds of millions of years old, look closer and that dating falls apart when scientists estimate the entire geologic record would be eroded away in a mere ten million years assuming measured rates of erosion. Experimental science measured this entropy and erosion. Those measurements undermined speculative philosophy’s attempts to justify atheism.
Even more fundamentally, the dust-to-Darwin problem is that the philosophy of atheism offers no plausible way for any kind of dust to get here in the first place without God. It presents no plausible explanation for how that dust came alive without God. It has no plausible way to explain why men and women are inhabiting earth right now without God.
But the most serious part of the dust-to-Darwin problem comes when normal, ordinary people realize that they have been deceived, fooled into filtering reality through atheistic mythology.
Weekly Parashah Readings
Parashah: Tazria 1 Nissan, 5782 – April 2, 2022
Torah: Leviticus 12:1 – 13:59
Haftarah: Ezekiel 45:18 – 46:15; Isaiah 66:1; Isaiah 66:23-24; Isaiah 66:23
Brit Chadashah: John 6:8-13; Matthew 8:1-4
Resources: Chabad, Hebrew4Christians, Weekly Torah Readings, Calendar
The darkness blinding us has gone.
We know the Lord as we are known.
Face to face we finally see
soaring past all mystery.
The part we could not see is shown.
Eugenia offers the word “soaring” for this week’s challenge.
1 Corinthians 13:12, “For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.“
Thomas longed to live in harmony with his neighbors but none of them deserved it. Everywhere he turned they would rush off just as he was warming up to explain again what they were doing wrong. They reminded him of those rats in his yard scurrying from one neglected debris pile to another.
In the evening, feeding on beer and popcorn, Thomas set his thoughts on the day’s alleged news and contentious commentary until he could stand it no longer and let his wagging tongue off its leash. At such breaking points he would rise, pace the floor, open his mouth, and without a clear understanding of what his hardened heart was leading him to say curse the stale air of his living room. Demons loved to party there.
Denise offers the word “harmony” to be used in this week’s Six Sentence Stories. This story is continued at Match – Six Sentence Story.
I was thinking of Proverbs 18:21, “Death and life are in the power of the tongue: and they that love it shall eat the fruit thereof.“
Dale offers the theme “as the world warms up” for this week’s Cosmic Photo Challenge.
I was walking along the beach on Friday afternoon. The sun was hot. The sand was hot. If it warms up any more I will have to put my sandals back on. So I waded in the water along the beach and saw a small section where some seaweed (and other stuff) was moving to shore.
I have no idea why I took these two photos of the same seaweed. The hot sand gave me hope they might fit the prompt.
23 Then spake Jesus to the multitude, and to his disciples,
Matthew 23:1-3, King James Version
2 Saying The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat:
3 All therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not ye after their works: for they say, and do not.
The oral Torah is part of the tradition of Rabbinic Judaism in addition to the written Torah of the Bible. Not all Jews accept this second Torah. Those who don’t are called Karaite Jews.
Nehemia Gordon, a Karaite Jew, described this oral Torah in the first half of the lecture below. Given Yeshua’s (Jesus’s) objections to the Pharisees he suspected Yeshua was an early Karaite Jew (although Christian and Messianic believers know He is much, much more).
Being also a Hebrew scholar who studied the Shem Tov Hebrew manuscript of Matthew as well as one who found other manuscript copies of it Gordon attempted to answer a question about Matthew 23:3 that has puzzled some. In spite of Yeshua’s objection to the oral Torah of the Pharisees why did He tell His disciples to do whatever “they bid you observe”?
Gordon observed that in the Hebrew manuscript of Matthew Yeshua told his disciples to do whatever “he” bid you observe where the “he” referred to Moses, not the Pharisees. If this section of the manuscript is more authentic, the puzzlement can be explained by a scribal error.
His explanation is in the second half of his talk starting about 1:15:50 in the video. For more details see his book, The Hebrew Yeshua vs. the Greek Jesus.
I am grateful to Benjamin Andreessen’s very detailed posts on this and similar topics in his MeWe group Hebrew Shalom.
To hear a positive view of the oral Torah see Rabbi Berel Wein’s informative and short presentation of Jewish history especially episodes Rebellion Against Rome and Exile, What Is the Talmud, and Writing of the Talmud.
Weekly Parashah Readings
Parashah: Shemini 23 Adar II, 5782 – March 26, 2022
Torah: Leviticus 9:1 – 11:47
Haftarah: 2 Samuel 6:1-7:17
Brit Chadashah: Hebrews 7:1-19; Hebrews 8:1-6
Resources: Chabad, Hebrew4Christians, Weekly Torah Readings, Calendar
Poetry, Short Prose and Walking 