It doesn't have to be big

Moses went up the mountain and he wasn't gone that long before the people started complaining.  Aaron being a bit on the weak side gave into them and said bring all your gold.  So they did and he made them a golden calf, an idol to worship as their god.

That's how the story goes, doesn't it?  I've read the book, seen the film.  Well this story was the reading in church the other Sunday and as I listened something stood out for me.  'Take off your gold ear-rings that your wives, your sons and daughters are wearing and bring them to me'.  Just ear-rings, surely not.  Wasn't it all your gold?  After all you wouldn't make much of a golden calf with just ear-rings, that amount of gold even with thousands of you wouldn't go far.

So I picked up another bible translation and checked it in there.  And there it was again, ear-rings.  It has always been the impression that the golden calf was quite large, but this must have been a rather puny thing.  How we get ideas in our minds no matter how much we read.  I would have put money on them being asked to bring all their gold.

I jotted it down in my sermon notes booklet, 'how big was the golden calf if only made from ear-rings.

Wednesday found me down the church, as I had opened it for any one to come in for prayer.  I opened my note-book and read my note from the other Sunday. 

'Why only ear-rings Lord', I asked, 'the calf must have been very small'. the answer came, 'Size isn't important, your idol need only be very small to take you away from me'.

So the Israelites gave up Almighty God for an iddy biddy tiny golden calf and gave their worship and put their faith in that. 

Makes me wonder why he pointed this out to me.  I will have to start looking to see if I have any golden calf's.

Jenny <><

 

His Father and Mine

I have read the gospel of John and studied it for over  30 years.  Yet it was only just this year that God opened my eyes  to the Father verses in it.  You wonder sometimes how you can be so blind.  This of course is all part of what he has been teaching me over the last few years.  How to live on the other side of the road.  To look at my christian life from another perspective.

God's Father heart.  He says he will not leave me an orphan, he will be my Father and I am his daughter. 

So I was re-reading John's gospel for the umpteenth time and Holy Spirit started to highlight certain verses to me.  Jesus did nothing on his own, said nothing but what the Father told him to.  He said he could only do what he saw the Father do. 

Now I expect someone will be laughing and saying after all these years didn't you know this, and the answer is yes of course I knew this.  I could have quoted the verses etc.

But now instead of knowing it, I KNEW it.  I could see it in my spirit.  Jesus, in communion with the Father, listening intently, watching through an open heaven what the Father was up to and then doing it himself.  totally submitted, totally obedient.

I looked again at what Jesus was actually doing and then imagined that the Father must be doing these things too in heaven.  How exciting and how busy is the Father.  What a picture of heaven it conjures up.

Jesus shows us what the Father is like when we look at him, so we know that the Father enjoys socialising.  Likes the occasional party, is compassionate, loves the poor and downtrodden.  Holds women in high regard.  Heals, raises from the dead, gets angry, cries and much more.

But Jesus also shows us how to be a son or a daughter by trusting, loving, listening to, spending time with, obedience to the Father.

How exciting it is when scriptures that you have read over and over suddenly open up a whole new dimension to your relationship with the Father and Jesus.  That WOW moment. Just like reading the bible for the first time.  With the eyes of the Holy Spirit one verse can have an infinite array of meanings depending on what you need to know at that moment.

The sad thing is there are not the  words to really describe what happened.  When put into words it somehow loses something in the telling.  But this is just another little piece of the puzzle that I am being taught in this season with the Father.  A Father heart season that seems to be world-wide at the moment.  He wants intimacy and to deepen the relationship with him who knows all things.  He is love and he wants us to know that love and to love him back.

Jenny <><