Flowers

I asked the ladies to bring in their favourite flower to the Home League this week. 

One lady brought in a bouquet of anemones, she said they were her favourite flower but they also reminded her of what scripture says about the flowers in the field how they soon fade and die and such is the glory of man, but all who are in Christ will not fade away but have eternal life through Jesus.

Another lady brought in a rather large sunflower. Apparently the sunflower follows the sun all through the day and turns its head toward the sun as it moves round, so too must we as Christians keep our face toward the Son of God and follow Him. She noted that it is so easily recognisable because it stands out from the other flowers, and it looks radiant. We too as Christians should stand out from the world, different from the world showing the light of Christ to those we come into contact with. 

Another thing she noted about the sunflower was the hundreds of seeds it produced, as Christians we should be prepared to share the seed of the gospel and pray that is will grow and bring forth fruit to the receiver, no matter who they are, Peter soon saw that God was willing to save anyone be they Jew or Gentile, 

Acts 10:34 Then Peter opened his mouth and said: "In truth I perceive that God shows no partiality.

The sunflower is very hospitable and gives food to all kinds of insects, it doesn’t seem to be partial, choosing only certain insects to help. We are to show the love of Christ to all, and help where help is needed. We too should be impartial, the scripture tells us to even help our enemy, 

Romans 12:20 Therefore “If your enemy is hungry, feed him;

If he is thirsty, give him a drink;

For in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head.”

The poor sunflower soon began to wilt because it had been removed from its source of nourishment, we too if we abandon studying God’s word, praying to God, and remove ourselves from fellowship with Spirit filled believers will soon begin to wilt spiritually. Our fellowship with the Lord will suffer and we will become lethargic, and useless to the kingdom.

Another lady brought the bindweed flower on its twining stem. She said as far as she was concerned it was a very pretty flower, really pleasing to the eye, but the bindweed lives up to it’s name and entwines itself around other flowers and plants chocking them, it takes over the garden if it is left alone. The tiniest piece of root if left in the ground will soon grow and just keep going making more and more and more. She said it reminded her of sin, which looks so pleasing to the eye and enticing but it entwines our heart if left unrepented, and it chokes the spiritual life out of us. We have to seek forgiveness and ask the Lord to remove every trace, every tiny root that we won’t be chocked but will grow healthy, and that we will mature by growing in grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus spoke of how His Word can be choked out of our lives, Matthew 13:22 “Now he who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.

I pray that if you know the Lord Jesus you will walk in the light of His Word and be a blessing to others. If you don’t know the peace and joy that knowing Jesus brings, look into the Holy Bible and read how God’s sent His Son to die in your place, He took the punishment for your sin that you may live eternally with Him and have a relationship with Him.

Living Stones

I asked the ladies to bring in some stones, which they did with interesting stories, some quite ordinary some precious, some that people had written on. I showed them some stones that my son had given me when he was small and I had saved them, then later I wrote people’s names on them and as I look at them or hold them I bring the person whose name is on the stone before the Lord. Another lady had found a stone in the shape of a heart and had written scripture on it, she said it reminded her of how the Lord takes a cold hard heart and turns into a heart of flesh, a caring, loving, compassionate heart.

We talked about stones mentioned in the Bible, some for good and some for bad like the stoning of Stephen. There are precious stones mentioned many times in scripture there are those that were on Aaron’s priestly breastplate, with the names of the tribes of Israel on, Exodus 39:8-21

Scripture tells us that Jesus is the cornerstone on which the foundation of the church is laid,

1 Peter 2:6-7 Therefore it is also contained in the Scripture,

“Behold, I lay in Zion A chief cornerstone, elect, precious,
And he who believes on Him will by no means be put to shame.”  7 Therefore, to you who believe, He is precious;

And all who believe on the Lord for their salvation are living stones, being built up into a building not made with hands,

1 Peter 2:5 you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. And we are precious in the site of God because we were bought at a great cost, one that we could never repay. 1 Peter 2: Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious.

We are more precious to God than all the precious stones and metals in the world, because our salvation was wrought at great cost, God sacrificed His Son, the only one who was able to take our punishment for our sins, and if we repent of our sins and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and all He has done then we are saved and are in the family of God. We are a precious child of God and He loves us with unfailing love, He cares for us, watches over us, hears us when we call, picks us up when we fall, He disciplines us. We are His sons and if God is for us then it doesn’t matter what man does to us.

The definition of precious is:

of great value; not to be wasted or treated carelessly,

men may devalue us and treat us carelessly, but God doesn’t and never will because He is faithful and just.