Sovereignty.

Hearing a conversation about sovereignty in one of our coffee shops, and reading about sovereignty in our local paper not long ago, made me look up the word Sovereign (Sovereignty) in the Bible.

This is what the Scripture says about Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 4:25,

“You will be driven away from people and will live with the wild animals; you will eat grass like the cattle and be drenched with the dew of heaven. Seven times will pass by for you until you acknowledge that the Most High is sovereign over all the kingdoms of men and gives them to anyone he wishes.”

Here a king, a Sovereign, is not only told to acknowledge that the Most High is sovereign over all the kingdoms of men, but that the Most High gives the kingdoms to anyone he wishes.

Acknowledge in your conversations about “sovereignty” that the Most high is sovereign; with other words, make known that the Most High is sovereign.

Yesterday in the evening I attended a country gospel concert. The band, from the Kaipara area, staged a fantastic performance at the KAITAIA BAPTIST CHURCH.

This picture is from last year at the same place

Yesterday in the morning I viewed the SHEEP DOG TRIALS here in Kaitaia from the grandstand.

“Connect for less this Christmas,” I am reading on the front page of The Warehouse mailer, I picked up today.

On the front page you can also see the pictures of four mobile phones.

I am sure it is all about connecting with family and friends this Christmas.

“Jesus is the reason for the season”

At Christmas time some years ago on our way from Auckland to Kaikohe we had a break of the journey in Whangarei and when asking someone at the car park about the meaning of Christmas the answer was meeting with family and friends.

Of course, the connection with family and friends at Christmas time is important and we should make the most of it.

But there is one connection which is more important than any other connection and that is our connection with God through our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.

If you don’t have a living relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ as yet, ask him to open your heart this Christmas.

This afternoon I saw written on the window of a church building:

“JESUS IS THE REASON FOR THE SEASON.”

AND SALVATION IS FREE!

The Law: Its Functions and limits

ROMANS Chapter 7:1 – 8:4

I find it exciting to read the exposition of ROMANS by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones.

He is preaching through the whole letter verse by verse and sometimes he has 3-4 sermons on one short verse.

That’s what we need these days.

Sometimes I have trouble putting the book down! I am now on page 205!

“You are being watched,” is written underneath the picture I am looking at just now in our local paper, The Northland Age, Thursday, December 11, 2014. On the image you can see two people fitting a camera at Kaitaia’s Z service station.

But we are not only being watched by state of the art CCTV systems.

The Bible tells us in Second Chronicles 16:9:

“FOR THE EYES OF THE LORD RUN TO AND FRO THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH, TO SHOW HIMSELF STRONG IN THE BEHALF OF THOSE OF THEM WHOSE HEART IS PERFECT.”

Read also first Corinthians 28:9; Psalm 94:11; Daniel 2:20 and Job 42:2.

All those verses teach us that God has all knowledge, that nothing is hidden from Him.

With other words God is omniscient.

OMNISCIENCE is only one of God’s natural attributes. He is also omnipresent (He is present everywhere at the same time) and omnipotent (He possesses all power).

An attribute is a quality, property or unique characteristic of something.

People who know and believe that they are being watched by the eyes of the Lord, do not really care that they are being watched by high definition, highly visible CCTV equipment to deter would-be robbers. They are obedient to the commandment which says, “You shall not steal.” (Exodus 20:15)