Living in noise

 

Luke 9:18

One day Jesus left the crowds to pray alone…..

Jesus walked in complete union with God, in complete obedience to what Abba had sent Him to do. In fact, He Himself said that He did not do anything that His Father had not shown Him to do. In our human way of thinking, we would assume that Jesus therefore did not need extra time with Abba, after all, He was constantly in touch with Him, was He not?

And yet He often secluded Himself to pray to His Father - alone, away from the clamouring crowds that were constantly demanding His attention, away from His disciples and family. In doing so, He set us an example that is a key element in hearing God’s voice, something Elijah physically experienced when he was hiding in the cleft in the mountain Horeb. He did not hear God’s voice in a mighty wind, earthquake, or fire, no, 1 Kings 19:12 After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. That great prophet instantly recognised the soft gentle voice of his God in the quietness surrounding him.

When we shut off the noise flooding our lives and quiet our souls before God, He can deal with the emotional anxieties, stresses and fears that then start arising within us during those moments. He has a way of showing us who we really are, the real inner being that we so often try to hide from the world, because we cannot hide anything from God in those intimate times with Him. The distractions in our lives successfully keep us so busy and engaged that we rarely find ourselves in the position described above. This means we are missing out, big time! Because as we increase these quiet times with God, it has an interesting effect:  our hearts become softer towards God and our desire for more of Him increases. We build up a strong inner core of trust and faith, and all of this comes not by doing something, but by being with Someone!

What is keeping us from spending quiet alone time with God? It could be that we are afraid of what will be exposed about us during those times, inner hurts that we cannot face maybe, or attitudes that we are very reluctant to change because that would mean changing our identity and way of living up to now. Another hindrance in our modern times would definitely be our addiction to constant media stimulation. And yes, it is an addiction, creating in our brains the same effects that taking cocaine has. We mistakenly equate solitude with loneliness, but meeting with God means that we have a Companion alongside us, we must believe this even though we do not see Him. We could also be reluctant to spend time with Him because we are afraid that God will not say anything – but that should not hinder us, because the point is to spend time with Him, not expecting anything, but just sitting in His presence.

Pearls to ponder:

How do I get started? Choose a time for your meeting, set your alarm if need be. Start small, one to two minutes maybe where you really focus on God Himself, not on a list of favours to ask Him. You can increase this time as you go on. Be consistent, try not to miss a single day of doing this. It helps if you choose a special place to meet Him, any place where you can be uninterrupted for a while. Invite Him there, remember Eli told Samuel to say: Speak Lord, for Your servant is listening? Just say something simple like: Here I am, Lord! And then quiet your soul, aim for silence, do not play worship music or speak. Just let your own thoughts pass by without giving them attention (e.g. your list of things to do that day!). And focus on Abba, Jesus, Holy Spirit, just stand in awe of Him, in reverence and thankfulness. This is different from the worldly way of meditating, you are not emptying your mind, you are intentionally focussing on Him. Keep doing this and see how God works in your life!

Still, be still my soul

What is in a name?

 

Luke 1:5

In the time of Herod king of Judea there was a priest named Zechariah, who belonged to the priestly division of Abijah; his wife Elizabeth was also a descendant of Aaron.

Have you ever thought about the spiritual meaning of your name? Many people do not realise that their name has a deep intrinsic value, because they think that it was randomly chosen for them by their parents. Traditionally, giving a family name to a newborn baby is what most parents would opt for. If not, parents of a soon-to-be-birthed little baby would typically work through a book of names, sifting and sorting until a shortlist is compiled that satisfies both, and gradually names would be eliminated until only one or two remain. Sometimes parents would just think of the name of somebody they liked and admired and choose to name their baby after that person.

There are parents who prayerfully ask the Lord what He would like them to name their child, and this is of course the best course of action. But the most wonderful thing about your name is that no matter how ‘randomly’ it was chosen by your parents, it is still in God’s will that you received that name!

How God uses names for His purposes is illustrated so well by the story of Zechariah and Elizabeth quoted above. He was a priest performing priestly services in the temple in Jerusalem, married to Elizabeth, but the couple remained childless until an angel appeared to him and told him that Elizabeth would give birth to a child in her old age. Zechariah’s Hebrew name was Zicharyah, meaning God has remembered, and Elizabeth was called Elisheva, meaning the oath of God. Their union in marriage spelled out a prophetic message to all who had eyes to see: God has remembered the oath of God.

This was a clear sign to Israel that God had not forgotten His oath to Abraham, because the baby Elizabeth gave birth to was named Yochanan, who was later to become known as John the Baptist – and his name means the grace of God - the grace of salvation through Jesus Christ, about Whom John had to testify all throughout his life.

Three names, no matter how they were decided upon, spelling out God’s intention to keep His eternal promises, at the exact time that those promises were being fulfilled – all orchestrated by God. Never doubt that your name is meant to be uniquely yours!

Pearls to ponder:

When people had to change their identity and direction in life, God often changed their names to reflect this. Abram became Abraham, Jacob became Israel. Our names often reflect the spiritual journey we are on. Find out what the Christian meaning of your name is and pray the godly promises contained therein over your life! Let God’s promises override the names we tend to give ourselves – names like lonely, forgotten, wounded. Replace them with: I am God’s child, He holds me in the palm of His hand, He is my Healer!

Hello My name is

The circle dance

 

Ex 23:14

“Each year you must celebrate three festivals in my honour.

When God gave Moses this instruction for the Israelites, He then also clarified what He meant by describing the names and details of the feasts He wanted them to keep. The name He used for ‘Feast’ was the Hebrew word Khag, which Strong’s defines as:

 châgag, khaw-gag'; a primitive root (compare H2283, H2328); properly, to move in a circle, i.e. (specifically) to march in a sacred procession, to observe a festival; by implication, to be giddy:—celebrate, dance, (keep, hold) a (solemn) feast (holiday), reel to and fro.

It therefore implies the gathering together for a festival, usually in the form of a circle for dancing and feasting.

God loves to see His people filled with joy and happiness and expressing this in jubilant dancing before Him, which is why He named His Feasts with a word that means just that. In fact, Abba has anointed His Son Jesus with abundant joy, giving Him a measure above all others as we read in Heb 1:9 You love justice and hate evil. Therefore, O God, your God has anointed you, pouring out the oil of joy on you more than on anyone else.” We know that Jesus attended wedding feasts, and I can easily picture Him joining a dancing circle on these occasions and celebrating with exuberant joy and laughter!

If we think about it, we can even come to realize that the khag is not limited to humans only, the earth also takes part in it as it performs its circle dance around the sun, joyfully proclaiming God’s greatness and power.

Certainly, dancing is not restricted to the Old Testament – there are quite a few words in the New Testament which equates joy with dancing or movement. In Matthew 5:12 the word ealats means ‘to jump for joy’ and pazaz means ‘to leap or bound’; in Acts 6:5 Prochorus was a Christian deacon, and his name means “one who leads in the circle dance”.

Pearls to ponder:

Are we prepared to bring a new dimension to the praise and worship of our God by dancing before Him? Knowing that it pleases Him, knowing that He instructed His children to do this? Or are we going to let tradition and legalism stand in our way?

Some churches have a formal dance group who will on occasion dance in front of the church to songs they have practised movements to, and this is to be commended - it gives talented dancers a platform to express their worship in a beautiful and godly way, so different from the way people dance in the world.

To those who would not dare to do so publicly, I encourage you to start moving before the Lord as you praise Him in the privacy of your own home. You do not need dance lessons, the Lord just wants your heart to be close to His, and your dance with Him will take you on a personal journey way above what you could ever have imagined!

Shavuot 2025

Weaving a tapestry

 

Esther 5:14

His wife Zeresh and all his friends said to him, “Have a pole set up, reaching to a height of fifty cubits, and ask the king in the morning to have Mordecai impaled on it. Then go with the king to the banquet and enjoy yourself.” This suggestion delighted Haman, and he had the pole set up.

Esther 7:10 So they impaled Haman on the pole he had set up for Mordecai. Then the king’s fury subsided.

As we read through the book of Esther, we see that there are many incidences in her life that surely did not add up for her. She had no mother of father - losing one parent would have been difficult enough for a young girl growing up, but losing both must have been devastating! She grew up in a foreign land, in Persia, where her people were exiles and where her culture and religion were subordinated to the whims of the ruling pagan despot, Ahasuerus (or Xerxes in Greek), someone who was easily persuaded by his advisors to act immorally – we see him divorcing his wife Vashti after she refused to entertain his intoxicated guests by showing off her beauty. We read that he fell for the suggestion to sleep with any amount of innocent young girls to select a fitting successor for the previous queen. He listened to and believed Haman’s lies about the Jewish people not keeping the king’s laws, then accepted his bribe of 10 000 talents of silver to decree that all Jews be destroyed.

Esther was captured to join the harem of this very same king, knowing full well what was required of her, and that, should she not be selected to become the next queen, she would disappear into the second harem forever. None of these happenings in her life so far could have made any sense to her – her upbringing by her devout cousin Mordecai must have instilled in her the knowledge of a loving God Who cared for her, Who would protect her from harm. She could so easily have rebelled and gone her own way. But she chose to let the inner light and beauty that her belief in her God had ignited in her, to shine through to such an extent that the wayward king could not resist her, in fact no one could as we read in Esther 2: 15 And Esther won favour in the sight of all who saw her. 

We know the rest of the story, how Esther intervened in Haman’s evil plot and saved her whole race from annihilation, how his evil plans to kill Mordecai backfired and he was in fact impaled on the very pole he had set up for Mordecai. All because Esther chose to stay true to her God, even though she surely could not have understood the events that unfolded before her. But there is even more: Esther must have had a hand in influencing king Artaxerxes I (successor to Xerxes) who appointed Ezra to lead a group of Jews from Babylon to Jerusalem to teach the laws of God, and 13 years later sent Nehemia to Jerusalem to rebuild the city walls.  I am sure that she would have been delighted to see the long-term effects of her dedication to her God!

Pearls to ponder:

When God weaves the tapestry of our lives, we simply cannot see what the whole picture is going to look like. We only see the colour that He is weaving into it at this moment in time, it does not necessarily make sense to us as we have such limited understanding of how all our life experiences are going to fit together in the end. Trust that He has a perfect picture in mind for the tapestry of your life, and stay true to Him no matter what! Your decisions to follow God today will impact not only your life, but the lives of your future generations to come!

Tapestry