MAC KIRK

St. Matthew 18 :10 " Take heed that you despise not one of these little ones, for I say to you that their angels do continually behold the face of my Father who is in the heavens."     One of the early church fathers comments on this in looking at the whole passage of Matthew 18," A believer is called not only a servant of God but also a son through the grace of adoption to whom the kingdom of heaven and the company of angels is promised."  Jesus had said the greatest in the kingdom of heaven would be like a little child.      We are humbled as we are reminded of the existence of angels in the work of our salvation.  They are instruments of good to God's people and are " ministering spirits for those to inherit salvation." Hebrews 1:14  The number of angels is great, " thousands thousands ...and ten thousand times ten thousand stood before him: the judgment was set, and the books were opened." Daniel 7:10     The...

Genesis 45 He is not a God of confusion, of discordance, or accidental, random, private courses in the execution of His will, but of determinate, regulated, prescribed action." - John Henry "Cardinal" Newman –     Today our focus is again on the record of Joseph from Genesis.  As I meditated on the Scripture for the First Lesson this week, I was reminded of the whole story by re-reading the context of chapter 45.  John Henry Newman reminds us above that all of life is under the watchful foreordained love and plan of God.  As Christians we affirm from the beginning of the Scriptures to the end that God has a hand on His children and will not let them go.  Different philosophies of the world describe life as fatalism or Deism.  We do not believe in either of these things if we read the Scriptures. Fatalism says that there is no loving personal God at the end of our lives , while Deism tries to affirm God by says He has no hand in the ordinary...

The Good Samaritan-Luke 10:25-27     This is the best known of all the parables/stories in the New Testament of course along with the prodigal son.  But just because people know about it , that does not mean they grasp its meaning.  Of course it is used by many to say, “ What did you do?”  But I think there is a far different heart of this story more than “ What did we do?”  It is not a story of earning our entrance into heaven by our good deeds as the world so often believes.  Of course our good deeds are so important in the Christian’s life and experience.  How else will someone know we have chosen to live by a different standard than the world has if we do not show it in our lives?      I think this illustration of the Good Samaritan is more of a story about God’s grace and not deserving eternal life by our good deeds alone.  We must have our hearts changed that we would be willing to be Good Samaritans to so...

Joseph and the dreams    Genesis 41     Apparently Joseph did not learn that dreaming got him into trouble.  Remember earlier when he was dreaming in chapter 37?  He dreamed his brothers were bowing down to him.  That did not go over too well  with the family.  The response by the brothers in 37:19 was when they saw him coming was to say ," Behold this dreamer cometh. Come now therefore, and let us slay him, and cast him into some pit..."  Reuben gets them to agree not to kill him but just to put him into the pit in the wilderness.  Dreams got Joseph into trouble.  We may say that happens a lot.  Anyone have any dreams lately?  God does work through His people in various ways and He certainly used dreams in Scripture.       When God communicates it sometimes gets us in trouble as well.  I just remember when that happens what my grandfather had over his study door, " One wi...