The Father Heart of God.

Knowing God stems from an ever deepening relationship with Him – a walk beside Him allowing Him to choose the direction. Of necessity it involves surmounting hills and rocky terrain, through storms and heatwaves, across rivers and in darkly shadowed valleys. Even in verdant meadows are the dangers of stepping in cow clap! But it is worth it all! Walking with God entails recognising where He is at work, and seeing His pain when others are invited but turn down the invitation.

Through the years I have recognised occasions when He has allowed me to experience with Him His Father heart. I have felt the pain of rejection, and He has helped me through. I have seen the results of disobedience and the consequences of deliberate sin, watching in horror when wrong decisions have been made leading to further problems, and felt the agony of having to stand aside, and watch.

When Jesus, (the personification of God, and the One who helps us understand what Love is) hung on the cross, His mother and others who loved Him had to stand by, and watch. What we call heartbreak is a common feeling for God. He could have programmed us to be good little clockwork people. He could even, like human parents, have pushed and prodded us to achieve the right results; and then punished our disobedience. But he didn’t. He allows us to make decisions and then live with the consequences. And in His Father Wisdom, He still works in every situation to bring good to those who love Him and are called according to His purpose. Romans 8:28 That is beyond what we can do. Sometimes we have to sit and watch mistakes being made, (especially when the children are grown and way beyond our jurisdiction), and do the biggest and best we can do, pray! Pray for God’s Will to be done, and know that in His answer will lie that unshakeable truth of His Love.

This weekend we remember how that truth was played out at Calvary. No heartache we can suffer, watching our children, and loving them through every chapter in their lives and living with their decisions, can come near to the suffering of God, the Father, Jesus, the Son, and Mary, the mother.

It all started in the first Garden, that place of beauty and perfection, where the first man and woman lived in harmony with God, their Creator Father. Evil slithered into the Garden of Eden, silently intruding into paradise, waiting a chance to insinuate lies into the faultless communication of God the Father with His first created children, Adam and Eve, They were innocent, devoid of sin until the serpent satan challenged the pride he first instilled into them, then used to break them. “You will not surely die,” the serpent said to the woman. “For God knows that when you eat it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” Genesis 3:4,5

It’s typical of satan to instil into open minds a feasible half-truth. Yes they would recognise good and evil, but too late to retain the good and refuse the evil! Conscience was born, and choices multiplied. And so their progeny was condemned to live under God’s condemnation, “…for dust you are and to dust you will return.” Genesis 3:19

For the first time, blood was shed in order that nakedness could be covered, and Adam and Eve were banished from the Garden, with no way back.

Centuries passed while Father God watched His children fall into ever greater sinfulness. In Noah’s day, it was so bad that God decided enough was enough. The Lord saw how great man’s wickedness on the earth had become, and that every inclination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil all the time. The Lord was grieved that he had made man on the earth, and His heart was filled with pain. Genesis 6: 5,6

After the flood, and a fresh start, God’s heart must have been hopeful. Patiently He watched, and waited, and saw the cycle begin again. He had not destroyed the source of evil, the satanic agenda to win the world to wickedness, but He had a plan. He called a man named Abram, and guided him into a life of faith. Abram believed the Lord, and He credited it to him as righteousness. Genesis 15:6

The Nation of Israel was born. And into that nation, many years later, came the Redeemer, the Saviour of mankind, Son of God, and Son of Man. Father God’s plan was reaching fruition. But it was a plan fraught with pain and agony, with obedience and determination, as infinite love triumphed over persecution, misunderstanding, torture and ridicule.

Redemption began in another Garden, the Garden of Gethsemane, when evil tried another tactic by confusing self-righteous minds into giving a death penalty; a death penalty in the cruellest form, for accusations with no evidence, and against the wishes of the judge. Yet the decision of the people was upheld; people whose minds were clouded and who had listened to the lies of the deceiver instead of listening to and accepting Truth, personified.

Yet that was part of the plan. The Father God knew what would happen, He had watched His children sinking further into the depths of pride, self-righteousness, distrust, and self-service. He knew what the outcome must be. Father and Son, back in the Kingdom of Heaven, had agreed that blood must again be shed, but this time to right the wrongs of Eden. The first blood that was shed was to make garments to cover nakedness. This blood would be shed to pay the price for all that had been unleashed in the first garden, and this blood would be used to wash guilty stains away.

The reason my Father loves me is that I lay down my life – only to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down of my own accord. I have authority to lay it down and authority to take it up again. This command I received from my Father. John 10:17,18

The agony of the Cross is over but the Father Heart of God still agonises over His children, wanting them to listen, learn from His Word, and receive the eternal life given through His Son.

Have a wonderful Easter remembrance of the Son’s obedience to His Father’s Heart.

Purim to Passover

Last month the Jewish nation celebrated the feast of Purim, a commemoration of a significant time in Jewish history, when an attempt was made to annihilate the Jews in Persia, modern Iran. This month the Passover feast is celebrated, while the Christian celebration is of Easter, when the crucifixion is recognised as the price paid for our redemption.

I’m not sure what sparked my interest, unless it was my previous writing on living under the circumstances, when I continued in my notes about the circumstances under which two women lived: Vashti and Esther.  Here were two women living under heavy circumstances who made choices that not only affected their own lives but those of countless others.  Laws were changed because of their refusal to stay under the circumstances.

Vashti, as the Queen of Persia, wife of Ahasuerus, or Xerxes ,in the Greek chronicles, was summoned by the king to parade her beauty before his drunken guests at an ongoing party. Now here was a king who ruled over 127 provinces, from India to Sudan. Rich, powerful, proud, and to be feared, he had spent 100 days showing his military power, general wealth and the abundance of his kingdom to hundreds of officials and visiting gentry. Now, after 7 days of heavy drinking, when the general rule was to drink as much as you like, when and where you like, the king decided to show off his wife’s beauty.

Imagine being married to the most powerful man in the empire, and feeling secure in such a position of opulence and influence. Then to be summoned, like a girl off the streets to appear before a crowd of drunken revellers; it was more than her pride would tolerate. The refusal to comply though, cost her her crown and her comfort. Never again would she enjoy the intimacy of her husbands company, and her banishment was to be an example to other wives who refused to submit to their husband’s commands.

Circumstance upon circumstance, but Queen Vashti’s decision paved the way for another queen with another choice to make. Esther, living in a humble home under the care of her cousin, Mordecai, was selected for a Beauty Pageant, the prize being the king! That circumstance involved a year of beauty treatments, but they paid off – she won!

Wonderful, until the crisis came. Her people would be killed, unless she intervened. Intervention would necessitate an interview with the king, but entering his presence without being called for could be tantamount to suicide. Knowing what we know of what happened when the previous queen crossed the line of convention and displeased the king, under Esther’s circumstances, what would we do? She chose to enlist the help of the people. She asked that Mordecai would request a fast to be undertaken by all the Jews of Susa.

(Because the book of Esther in the Bible does not include the Name of God, I take the liberty of presuming that a fast must have been for a purpose of prayer, and to whom would those prayers be directed if not to Elohim, Creator and Judge of the universe.)

Then, risking her life, Esther sought audience with the king. She climbed out from under, and won the lives of her people.

Now, what excites me, is the relationship between Purim and Passover, which I discovered in my digging deeper time. The date that Pur, meaning the lot, was cast to Haman, when he presented his plan for the extermination of the Jews to the king, was the 13th day of Nisan. Nisan is the first month of the Hebrew calendar, dating from the time of the Passover, when the firstborn of the Israelites were protected from the plague prior to the Exodus from Egypt.

The day when Esther went in to see the king would have been Nisan 15, which meant that the Jews of Susa fasted during Passover that year.

I found this information in the web site of derek4messiah and I quote another gem from the Jewish readings over the feast.

Passover Haggadah: “Not just one Pharaoh rose against us to exterminate us, but in every generation did they rise up to exterminate us, and each time the Holy One Blessed Be He has rescued us from their hands.”

Both Passover and Purim occurred outside the land, in Egypt and Persia. Both involved the near extermination of the people of Israel. Moses and Esther both appeared before kings to rescue their people. Pharaoh’s army and Haman both perished.

Just another encouragement to us all not to live under a burden of circumstance, but celebrate that in Jesus there is no circumstance so heavy that He cannot help you out from under!

Be blessed this Easter time, and remember the relationship between what we celebrate as Easter, and what the Jewish nation celebrate as the Passover. Keep in prayer the nation of Israel as they continue the battle with those who wish to destroy them.