Looking for Goals in Life--by Linden Malki

One of the bits of advice that adults often offer children and students is that they need to have goals in their lives. Some kids have demanding goals that they work for singlemindedly, some see something that looks or sounds interesting, some have ambitions that are unrealistic, some are pushed by parents or other adults to fulfill their own goals, some haven't the foggiest idea. Some--not too many, I suspect,  pray for God's guidance.

The whole idea of goals is probably more common in western countries; children in the Middle East and eastwards, have traditionally no choice of their future. In most cases, you are born with your state in life and very few break out of it, probably more so with the modern information culture.  Some years ago, I spent a summer in Jordan, that included spending time with a missionary cousin who was head of a hospital up in northern Jordan near the Syrian border. He got a call from the hospital during dinner, as the doctor on duty needed help; he had been pushed into medical school by his local family when he had really hoped to become an artist.

 We don't often realize that God has goals for us as well. He will let us know, if we listen, what it is
that God is calling us to. Sometimes we realize, when we have what we thought we wanted, that we need to back out and listen. Sometimes what we thought was the right track blows up in our faces. What we usually need to do, but hesitate a bit is to stop and ask God what gifts He gave us and what he wants us to do with them.  When I was in high school, I was into science and interested in the space program, then just building up. I started college as a physics major, started with a year of basic physics and calculus. I realized before the end of the year that it would cost of all my time, and I really didn't want to do lab reports until 2am any more. I was lucky, because I was also well into the math, which became my major.My first decision for the next year was to take as much as I could of what really interested me, with the idea that I would have background in whatever I was led to in the next three years. What eventually happened is that I had an the opportunity to spend a summer in the Middle East and meet the man I married. He had an auto repair shop, and I had a background in physics, chemistry, history, library cataloging, turned out to be the best background I could have had. I am convinced that God knew what I could learn to do well, and put me in a place to do it--a place that also gave our kids opportunities to find their goals as well.

Taking Time to Remember--by Linden Malki

   

"Foursquare and seven years ago our Forefathers brought forth a new nation."  At one time, schoolchildren were encouraged to memorize this speech, which was originally given at the dedication of a military cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

 At that time, the war that created the need for the cemetery, was still in progress.  One thing that was unique in American history about this war, was that it was going between American and American, and one of the underlying concepts was a speech by the same speaker, Abraham Lincoln, two years before he became President: but was already a guiding principle in his political life: a quotation from the Gospel, "A house divided against itself cannot stand."

 There were several issues going on behind the stress that threatened the unity of a country that was different than any other nation; they included slavery and its possible spread; trade policies, and old-fashioned power struggles. We all know who won, and the price paid by Lincoln himself, and that there are still some of the same issues still haunting us. But one thing that came out of this war was the growth of a tradition, originally something that became a habit with the families of those who had also lost their lives in this war.  It was on a variety of days originally, usually on an annual basis, but once a year the families would go to cemeteries, especially military ones, and bring flowers and other decorations to honor their fathers, and brothers, and later grandfathers, who had fallen in the "War Between the States." The first official celebration,  put together by a Union general was held in Waterloo, New York, on May 30. In 1868, it moved to  Arlington National Cemetery. There have always been local celebrations on various days as well. It was expanded to include the World War I, and then all war dead before and after. It was originally called "Decoration Day" until  it was officially called Memorial Day and moved to the fourth Monday in May.

Wars have always been part of human society; we seem to have a tendency to solve problems the messy way. There have been political movements to "outlaw war", but the universal tendency of people to be stubborn, greedy, and generally difficult to get along has been a problem. Even the Bible describes wars, most of which were caused by quarrels, rivalries, idolatry, and the same things we still see today, and the tough choices are usually situations where people are causing trouble which cannot be tolerated. We know that if everyone were to follow the commands of God, the love of God, and appreciate the blessings of God, we could live in peace--which will happen when God takes control of situations that we have not dealt with well.

God-Designed Families--by Linden Malki

Last week, I was reading Genesis 1 & 2, preparing the Bible readings for Mothers' Day--and immediately noticed something I had read before, but never realized how important is is.  Genesis 1:27 says that "male and female He created them." We know that this doesn't only apply to human beings--almost every life form larger than microscopic is created male and female; plants as well as animals; insects, sea creatures, fish, reptiles, birds, mammals.  In most cases, there is what is called "dimorphism", which means that the male and female versions are structually different. And notice that it is always 2 versions of the creature; there is nothing random about it. When you look at mammals, the biological variance between the male and female versions is affects most of the adults; and still they are recognizably the same species. There is no way that this is the result of random mutations! The other thing that we see in these creatures is that they were designed to be a couple--"one flesh".  They become  a family, committed to each other and their children.    When they made the choice to be their own bosses, they took on a responsibility that is not easy; of their first two sons, one was a murderer.

There are several ways we differ from all other creatures: we can talk, and we can think and design and build. We are created with the ability to do worse than we can imagine. We can also do better than we can imagine. (This happens when we allow God to give us the wisdom and strength to do our best.)  We see this happening in Scripture; most of the families have internal rivalries and resentments. (Actually, most of the issues between siblings is related to rivalries. ) There are any number of stories of family disharmony in Scripture and very few healthy ones. There are also a number of women mentioned; some are good and some aren't. My favorites are Deborah, who served as a judge in the days before the monarchy, and who led an army into battle when the men wouldn't;  Hulda, called a "prophetess" in the late days of the Judean monarchy, was the person consulted by King Josiah when early manuscripts,  which had gotten hidden or lost during a time when pagan gods were popular, reappeared in the Temple and were brought to the King; and Priscilla, who, with her husband Aquila, were very knowledgeable about the early church doctrine and on several occasions taught new converts the truth about Jesus and his church.

As parents, we have a responsibility to raise our children to understand good and evil, and in knowledge of God.  Our precious children are entrusted to us for a fairly short time, and then they are responsible for acting as they were taught--deliberately or unknowingly.

The Price of Power--by Linden Malki

When Joshua was giving instructions to the Israelites who were getting ready to finally enter the Promised Land, this is what he told them: " Ponder and meditate on it day and night, making sure you practice everything written in it. Then you’ll get where you’re going; then you’ll succeed. Haven’t I commanded you? Strength! Courage! Don’t be timid; don’t get discouraged. God, your God, is with you every step you take.” (Joshua 1:8-9 Msg)  Jesus, 1500 years later but very close to the same area,  was dealing with a similar concept: Satan had just made Jesus a proposition. Satan would give Jesus rulership of the whole world--the condition being that Jesus would recognize Satan's authority over all the peoples of the world. Jesus' answer:  "Worship the Lord your God and only the Lord your God. Serve him with absolute single-heartedness.” (Luke 4:8 Msg) I found it interesting that Jesus (whose Hebrew name was actually "Joshua") was committed to the same instructions as His predecessor had given.
We've been thinking and reading the last few weeks about what the most important things in our lives need to be to follow these instructions. I tried to picture what the world would have looked like if Jesus had taken Satan up on his offer of political power. The first thought was that if Jesus had actually had total political power, He could have made everybody follow Him and life would have been perfect. On second thought, living a good life without any options would have been lazy and sloppy.  Then I realized that the real trap in this offer would that Satan would still have had ultimate power, with the nice guy as the figurehead.  Could have been like Chicago or New York, run by politicians who are tools of the Mafia, with the harbor full of uncooperative guys wearing cement shoes. We actually can imagine this; we know a little bit about how ugly the underside of a society without character and morals can be. 

Being ready isn't difficult on paper: Read the Word, think about it, do what it says. God supplies the strength and courage better than we can.  Open our eyes to the alternative: a world run by evil. If we don't understand what evil can do, that's our fault. The bottom line is: who's the expert on the power of the dark side, and Who has the power to keep us in the Light?  I am reminded of what I think is the most important line of an old familiar Christmas carol: "And fit us for Heaven, to live with Thee there!"

We are not on the planning level with God! by Linden Malki

Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel spoke of  End Times,  generally in terms of a takeover of the Land of Israel by God or someone sent by God.  This goes back to the Exodus, when the "Children of Israel", descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who was renamed "Israel" when he struggled with God after having to leave his childhood home.  Jacob/Israel was the father of 12 sons, who went to Egypt during a famine and settled there.  400 years later, those descendants of Israel had become enslaved by the Egyptians, and they escaped and returned to their original homeland through the intervention of God through an Israelite named Moses.  1500 years later,the surviving  Judeans were constantly expecting direct rule by God Himself to happen at any time, and there were no shortage of candidates for this revolution. 

When Jesus appeared,  there were those who attempted to make Him a King and expected the heavenly army to show up and re-establish the Kingdom of God.  He explained that he could not stay on earth and was taken back into Heaven--but said that he would return and there would be a new world established under the direct rule of God. However, what did happen is that He did maintain a spiritual relationship with anyone who accepted the terms of this relationship, which developed into what we know as the Church.

The original church was looking for a return within their lives, but it didn't happen. He told them it wouldn't, that nobody knew, but there are still those who claim to know what God didn't tell us. One of those times was the coming of a year designated as 1000AD, complicated by varying calendars. There was  a Jewish rabbi of the 1600's who claimed to be the prophet of the Messiah (the Jewish version) who gained a large following, was eventually jailed by the Ottoman authorities in Constantinople, and was offered the options of execution or Islam--and lived the rest of his life in the Ottoman court.

There have been several major church organizations founded on preachers who claimed to be the messengers of the Last Days. One was the Seventh-Day Adventists, whose founder was convinced that the second coming was due in 1844.  Another was the Mormons, who believe we live in the last days, and the Jehovah's Witnesses originally expected the end to be in 1914, and still emphasize a coming end.  Another interesting suggestion was a reading of an ancient Mayan calendar, which was being interpreted to say that it ended in December, 2012.

We still don't know any more than the disciples who lived with him and saw his ascension into Heaven--and we are still supposed to live every day like it could be tomorrow.

Death is Not the End!--by Linden Malki

The obvious miracle of the Resurrection is that Jesus died, and in three days reappeared as a living man. The idea of the resurrection of the dead is not new; there are three examples in the Old Testament, four in the Gospels, and two in Acts. However, each of the others was done through the intermediation of a follower of God (except for the mention in Matthew 27:51-53 of bodies in Jerusalem tombs raised by the power of God at the time of Jesus' death).  The three instances of Jesus' raising the dead was pity on mourning families, with the addition of the raising of Lazarus being a demonstration of His power over death. There is also the appearance of Jesus to Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus. There are two instances of resurrections in the very early days of the Church, one by Paul and one by Peter.

It is also significant that the idea of resurrection through a prophet of God happened three times in the Old Testament; one associated with Elijah, and two with his successor Elisha. Both of these prophets lived in the 9th Century BC, after the separation of the Southern Kingdom of Judah, ruled by the dynasty of David and Solomon, and the Northern Kingdom of Israel, ruled at this time by Ahab.  He was the son of Omri, who had been a general in a period of conflicting claimants and emerged as a strong ruler.  Ahab's wife Jezebel was a princess from Phoenicia and a strong follower of the pagan "god" Baal. Elijah was the most famous of the Israelite prophets, and went head-to-head with the priests of Baal at a dramatic challenge on Mt Carmel, where he showed the power of God and destroyed the pagan priests. He is also remembered for raising the dead son of a widow, whose meager supply of wheat and oil fed them through a three-year drought. He also is remembered for having been carried to Heaven in a chariot of fire.

The most dramatic appearance of Elijah in the Gospels is what we call the Transfiguration, where Elijah and Moses are seen with Jesus on a mountaintop. (Matthew 17; Mark 9; Luke 9), Elijah is a fascinating character because of the strength he showed during his lifetime against pagan worship(and also his depression after that battle), and the way he was taken by God, which is an example of the life beyond this earth, and the possibility of his return.

 Elisha also had a long ministry under several Northern kings, also revived the dead son of one of his supporters. After his own death and burial, a body of an Israelite happened to be dropped during a Moabite raid into Elisha's tomb, and came back to life.

Because of the fact that Elijah did not die but was taken to Heaven (which had only happened once before: Enoch, in Genesis 5), there were many later prophecies of his return. One of them is Malachi 4:5, and another is Luke 1:17 which quotes the Malachi prophecy. During the ministries of both John the Baptist and Jesus, there were questions of one or the other one possibly being Elijah; even during the crucifixion, the bystanders thought He was calling for Elijah (Matthew 27:47-49).  Even today, traditional Jewish Passover observances leave an empty chair for Elijah, if he were to come. 

I Kings 17:17 Some time later the son of the woman who owned the house became ill. He grew worse and worse, and finally stopped breathing. 18 She said to Elijah, “What do you have against me, man of God? Did you come to remind me of my sin and kill my son?”19 “Give me your son,” Elijah replied. He took him from her arms, carried him to the upper room where he was staying, and laid him on his bed. 20 Then he cried out to the Lord, “Lord my God, have you brought tragedy even on this widow I am staying with, by causing her son to die?” 21 Then he stretched himself out on the boy three times and cried out to the Lord, “Lord my God, let this boy’s life return to him!”22 The Lord heard Elijah’s cry, and the boy’s life returned to him, and he lived. 23 Elijah picked up the child and carried him down from the room into the house. He gave him to his mother and said, “Look, your son is alive!”24 Then the woman said to Elijah, “Now I know that you are a man of God and that the word of the Lord from your mouth is the truth.”

Altogether, Enoch lived a total of 365 years. Enoch walked faithfully with God; then he was no more, because God took him away.  Genesis 5:23-24

5 By faith Enoch was taken from this life, so that he did not experience death: “He could not be found, because God had taken him away.”[a] For before he was taken, he was commended as one who pleased God. Heb 11:5

The Best News Ever Told--by Linden Malki

One of the things that always impresses me about the Bible is that the people are real--we know people just like most of the characters. Not just goody-goody ones that one might expect, but wondering people, and hurting people, and people who mess their lives up, and people who don't know what they are doing or why. One of the interesting collection of people we read about in Scripture are the ones that we read about at this time of year. These are people that had a truly one of a kind experience--many different kinds but all reacting to one major event in the history of our world.

It starts with a death of a friend of Jesus and his friends; a man named Lazarus. When he got sick, his sisters reacted with what would seem, up till then, an unusual expectation. They knew that they knew someone who could save his life--in that day, this would not be a usual expectation, But they knew Someone who had been saving lives in their area, and if He would only come, Lazarus would be healed. Jesus had gotten the message that Lazarus was seriously ill, but to everyone's amazement, Jesus didn't show much concern. When Jesus finally showed up, Lazarus had been dead for four days. To everyone's total surprise, Jesus demonstrated something they didn't expect--He healed him even from this; and explained to the sisters that He had the power over life and death. Everybody else got the message: the local authorities, the Sadducees and Pharisees and all the other religious/political big shots, that this was something out of everyone's experience and could not be tolerated. They had finely balanced political arrangements with the rulers in Rome that they would see that nothing would upset. It was already getting dicey, because there were political factions who were determined to provide that upset. The establishment leaders cooked up a proposition: it would be expedient for the most visible rabble-rouser to die.

We know the story--the authorities manipulated the crowds to turn their unrest onto Jesus, and He allowed it to happen. There were those who expected legions of angels to rescue Him and eliminate the Romans, but they didn't. He was arrested and executed and buried, and--He didn't stay dead. This was hard for the people, even his followers, to understand; there have always been those who still think it's fake news. Even His follower Thomas didn't believe it at first, and demanded proof--which to his credit, he recognized the truth as soon as he saw it.

It started with the small group of followers, and then larger groups, and then the impassioned preaching of His followers who "turned the world upside down", for which we are-- literally--eternally grateful.