By Elizabeth Prata
SYNOPSIS: A cross-country journey leads to a deeply unsettling night at the Salton Sea, where unexplainable fear stirs reflection on spiritual darkness, human wandering, and the ultimate safety, purpose, and peace found in Christ.
Continue reading “The Night the Desert Watched Us”By Elizabeth Prata
A reader asked about the spiritual realm. She wisely noticed that though the Bible is clear that there is a spiritual realm, she was hesitant to delve into its study because of all the wacky, outlandish and downright bizarre books and posts about it.
It is a huge subject! Angels are interesting, and I am like my reader, wondering why not many preachers preach on the subject. Though, if you are fortunate to be in a church that preaches expositionally (verse by verse through a book of the Bible), then perhaps the preacher will credibly address it when it naturally arises. It IS a legitimate feature of most Systematic Theology divisions, it’s called Angelology.
Angels were created by God before He created the world. We know this from Job, because the angels shouted with joy when God did create the universe and worlds. (Job 38:6). In Genesis 1:31 by the end of creation week they had not fallen and were still holy, because God declared everything at that point, “very good”.
They are spirit beings, but they have a personality and a personal will. Some are named in the Bible- Michael and Gabriel for sure, probably Lucifer (Satan), and possibly Apollyon/Abaddon. The mentions of “The Angel of the LORD” are usually interpreted to be a pre-incarnate Jesus.
Then the 6-day creation happened, including earth and God making man. By the next verse after the 2 humans He made, Genesis 3:1 shows us a cunning serpent, which most take to be satan, questioning God’s goodness with the woman. So, by then, some angels had fallen into sin and rebelled. Satan visited the woman in the garden, and Adam was with her. We do not know exactly how long between the end of creation day 6 and the angels’ fall happened, just we know between Genesis 1:31 and Genesis 3:1 things were not ‘very good’ any more because the serpent duped the woman by questioning God’s standards. Satan (a title meaning Accuser or Adversary) was one of them who fell. Most theologians believe his name is Lucifer. According to most interpretations of Revelation 12:3–4, satan convinced about a third of the created holy angels to follow him into rebellion against God, now becoming unholy, AKA demons.
Lucifer was found to have sin in his heart. (Ezekiel 28:15). This is how we know angels have a personal will. He was discontent, and started up rumors doubting God’s goodness. He was internally filled with violence (Ezekiel v. 16). His desire and intent is mentioned in Isaiah, a section known as the “5 I Wills”. Isaiah 14:12-15 says-
Ezekiel 28:12-16 mentions satan as one of the highest cherubs who became proud and fell.
“How you have fallen from heaven,
You star of the morning, son of the dawn!
You have been cut down to the earth,
You who defeated the nations!
13“But you said in your heart,
‘I will ascend to heaven;
I will raise my throne above the stars of God,
And I will sit on the mount of assembly
In the recesses of the north.
14‘I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.’
15“Nevertheless you will be brought down to Sheol,
To the recesses of the pit.”
Lucifer/Satan and his cohorts are now unholy angels, or better known as demons. The demons oppose God by attempting to thwart His plans. They incite sin, make war, lay traps for the unwary, foment chaos, hinder God’s holy angels as one of them did to Daniel in Daniel 10:13 by preventing the angel to reach Daniel in answer to Daniel’s prayer, and more. They also have the ability to possess an unsaved person’s body (they cannot possess a Christian, we are sealed with the Holy Spirit, (Ephesians 1:13-14; 1 John 4:4).
What do holy angels do? A LOT! I was surprised when I heard a sermon by John MacArthur and he outlined all the things angels do and I had not known how busy they are! Did you know they execute judgment? They brought the Law? They are priests to God, they minister to God’s people, they bring messages, comfort, and more. They worship God in the temple, they guard things, like the entrance to Eden. John MacArthur preached on what the angels do in a 3-part series I linked below. Once you listen to that and then see in the Bible how much angels do and how much they are around, you can’t unsee it!
Angels: God’s Invisible Army, Part 1 https://www.gty.org/sermons/1361/angels-gods-invisible-army-part-1
Angels: God’s Invisible Army, Part 2 https://www.gty.org/sermons/1362/angels-gods-invisible-army-part-2
Angels: God’s Invisible Army, Part 3 https://www.gty.org/sermons/1363/angels-gods-invisible-army-part-3
More resources:
Satan: What is he like? https://www.gty.org/sermons/1355/satan-what-is-he-like
Satan: How does he operate? https://www.gty.org/sermons/1356/satan-how-does-he-operate
Good Angels: https://www.mljtrust.org/sermons/great-biblical-doctrines/good-angels/
“The Devil and the Fallen Angels”: transcript, audio was lost. follow up to Martyn Lloyd Jones’ first part called Good Angels, https://the-end-time.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/fallen-angels-sermon-transcription-lloyd-jones.pdf
Angelology and Demonology are fascinating subjects, but a student of Jesus is wise to be cautious about what is real and what is not. Both those subjects, particularly demonology, have a LOT of crazies preaching wrong stuff. Those subjects seem to invite a lot of extra-biblical speculation, experiential anecdotes, and just plain weird doctrines that have no place in any serious discussion.
John MacArthur preached for nearly 60 years, actively. He said there were only two times he came across a demon-possessed person. John Piper preached for nearly that long, and encountered a demonic possession only once. We cannot see demons, they are spirit beings. If a ministering angel incarnates and walks among us, we most often are unaware of their presence (Hebrews 13:2), but there seem to be rare occasions that a person could detect him. If so, it’s most likely an unholy angel, since the holy angels obey God and as Hebrews says, we are unaware of entertaining them.
There seemed to be a lot of demonic possession in the Bible but you see that the demons intensify their activity when God’s plan is coming to fruition. For example, in Genesis 6, during the time of the Prophets, and especially during Jesus’ earthly ministry. They will again be given opportunity to do their worst during the Tribulation of the last of the last days. But demonic possession is not rampant and most Christians never encounter it.
Demons ONLY do as much, no more or less, than Jesus orders them to. When God told satan he could harass Job, satan was also told not to take Job’s life. Satan obeyed that command. When the legion of demons in Gadara met Jesus they begged Him not to send them into the pit (which they knew He could.) They didn’t demand, they begged. He sent them into the pigs instead. Demons only do what is in God’s plan. A few early on that disobeyed His orders were locked up in the abyss (Jude 1:6 and 2 Peter 2:4).
So demons are allowed by God to do certain things as part of His desire to push forward His redemptive plan, to test Christians, to sanctify us through trials, to hand over the sinning ungodly to His wrath, and so on.
2 Thessalonians 2:9 says of the Antichrist, that “the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and false signs and wonders”
Satan has power to deceive the elect, if that is possible (Matthew 24:24), with his lying signs and wonders. Remember, the magicians of Pharaoh, named in the New Testament as Jannes and Jambres, kept pace with God’s signs done through Moses, until the plague of gnats. There, they failed, their power unable to match the increasing complexity of the signs. They eventually conceded that God is the greater power, but failed to convince Pharaoh.
Here is Randy Alcorn on the topic of why satan keeps opposing God when he obviously knows God’s word and the ending- https://www.epm.org/resources/2025/Jun/25/ultimate-outcome-oppose/
Spiritual battles take place every day, but normally a battle is against our own sin and against the world that wants us to sin. We defeat sin by refusing to sin, praying, relying on the Holy Spirit, and staying in the word of God.
We may at times be influenced directly by a demon, but more likely they influence us in general by formulating false societal constructs (‘love is love’, feminism, liberal theology, etc.), tempting us with porn, putting ungodly television shows on, inserting ungodly ideas into books, and so on.
If someone says they have seen a demon, perhaps they are making it up. Or sometimes it can be seemingly real to the person but they are being influenced by books or movies, or dreams that seem real.
Occasionally we hear of outbreaks of alleged demonic possession. These are called “mass hysteria outbreaks”. They almost affect females of adolescent age. Malaysia is a Muslim country with Islam being the state religion. It’s called the mass hysteria capital of the world. The BBC wrote this article about demonic outbreaks:
An outbreak of mass hysteria usually begins with what experts call an “index case”, the first person to become affected. In this story, that is Siti. “It doesn’t happen overnight,” says Robert Bartholomew. “It starts with one child and then quickly spreads to others because of an exposure to a pressure-cooker environment of stress.” And all it takes is a major spike in anxiety in a group situation, like seeing a fellow classmate faint or have a fit – to trigger a reaction in another person.
In Salem, the location of the famous witch trials of the late 1600s, an indigenous slave who dabbled in sorcery had filled some adolescent girls’ heads heads with stories and showed them how to perform certain magic. One story goes of how the witch hysteria began was that several of the Puritan adolescent girls tried repeating what the slave, traditionally named Tituba, had shown them. When they were caught, they accused Tituba of bewitching them. The events ran from there. As it went along, the girls had to keep up the story and a mass hysteria event spread, all from the girls aged 9-20. They fell down, had fits, barked, and other displays of alleged demonic possession, whether real or imagined,
There are many reasons to be cautious about any tales of the demonic.
There are numerous holy angels and fallen angels. Myriads upon myriads, an uncountable number to the ancients, are said to have been created. The holy angels work for God diligently and worshipfully. The fallen angels will be cast into the lake of fire forever after being judged.
Do you not know that we will judge angels? How much more matters of this life? (1 Corinthians 6:3).
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary says of the verse: “judge angels—namely, bad angels. We who are now “a spectacle to angels” shall then “judge angels.” The saints shall join in approving the final sentence of the Judge on them.”
What a day that will be!
By Elizabeth Prata
SYNOPSIS: I reflect on the internet’s evolution from a joyful tool for connection and faith-sharing to a platform spreading moral confusion, proposing that ordinary Christian family life has become a radical witness.
Continue reading “The Quiet Revolution of the Christian Home”By Elizabeth Prata
Hebrews 13:8 says, Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today, and forever.
It is a gross misunderstanding of the nature and character of God if a person thinks Jesus is “mean” in the Old Testament and “nice” in the New Testament. He is the same. He feels the same way about repentance, He has the same compassion for children, He still hates idolatry, and He has always abhorred false prophets. False prophets are called false teachers in the New Testament.
In the past:
If a prophet or a dreamer of dreams arises among you and gives you a sign or a wonder, 2and the sign or the wonder comes true, of which he spoke to you, saying, ‘Let’s follow other gods (whom you have not known) and let’s serve them,’ 3you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or dreamer of dreams; for the LORD your God is testing you to find out whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul. 4You shall follow the LORD your God and fear Him; and you shall keep His commandments, listen to His voice, serve Him, and cling to Him. 5But that prophet or that dreamer of dreams shall be put to death, because he has spoken falsely against the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you from the house of slavery, to drive you from the way in which the LORD your God commanded you to walk. So you shall eliminate the evil from among you. (Deuteronomy 13:1-5).
In the future:
1“On that day a fountain will be opened for the house of David and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for defilement. 2“And it will come about on that day,” declares the LORD of armies, “that I will eliminate the names of the idols from the land, and they will no longer be remembered; and I will also remove the prophets and the unclean spirit from the land. 3And if anyone still prophesies, then his father and mother who gave birth to him will say to him, ‘You shall not live, because you have spoken falsely in the name of the LORD’; and his father and mother who gave birth to him shall pierce him through when he prophesies. 4Also it will come about on that day that the prophets will each be ashamed of his vision when he prophesies, and they will not put on a hairy robe in order to deceive; (Zechariah 13:1-4)
People are so captivated by miracles, signs, wonders, omens and such. They crowded around Jesus in His day and they seek them now. Some are simply ignorant, others are desperate for healing, others just like a show with adrenaline pumping music and the titillation of the unexpected, and still others place all their hope in the immediate gratification of something they deem as ‘supernatural’.
In the Deuteronomy verses, we read ‘if the sign or wonder comes true…’ we read from John MacArthur, “Miraculous signs alone were never meant to be a test of truth. See Pharaoh’s magicians in Exodus 7-10. A prophet or dreamer’s prediction may come true, but if his message contradicted God’s commands, the people were to trust God and His word rather than such experience.“
Yet today people clamor for a show, just like in the Bible days. They have swapped truth for experience. But God is stern in His warning not to stray from His word. His word is ALL. We see the penalty for trusting a false prophet or teacher in Old Testament times and in Zechariah’s future scene of the Millennium Kingdom.
In Deuteronomy the penalty for speaking lies in God’s name is death. In the future Millennial Kingdom during the cleansing of Israel, there will be such a hatred of false prophesying that even a mother or father will enact their own penalty of death upon their own offspring, if that son speaks prophesying lies in God’s name. In that future time there will be such a hatred for false prophesy and such a thirst for holiness and truth that as MacArthur puts it, “[T]he hatred of false prophecy will overrule normal human feelings. They’ll be the first to condemn the apostate to death.”
I fervently wish that during this time of ours, that people would hunger for the truth so much that they would hate false teachings. False teachings and the people who perpetuate them are the worst of the worst. God killed Uzzah for accidentally touching the ark, how do we suppose God feels about those who live their lives purposely drawing His people away from Him? Putting lies in God’s mouth? Woe to those who forget His holiness and purity. Woe to those who decide to worship Him in their own way.
Not to enact their own vigilante-ism, of course, but to hate false teachers so much that the same fierceness would be evident in their opposition to such falsity.
God is the same all the time. He hated false teachings then and He hates it now. Please take the utmost care in who you follow and under which teachers you sit.
Further Resources
Why did God strike Uzzah dead for touching the Ark of the Covenant?
By Elizabeth Prata
Philip found Nathanael and said to him, “We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and also the prophets wrote, Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” Nathanael said to him, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” (John 1:45-46a)
This verse is from chapter 1 of the Gospel of John. The context is that Jesus has begun calling His disciples, who would become the Apostles later. In the previous verses, He had called Andrew and his brother Simon (who shall be called Peter). Now, Philip who was from Bethsaida, went to Cana where Nathanael was from, to tell him the news.
Nathanael’s skepticism rested on the fact of Jesus’ origins, which were from Nazareth, a backwater. So Nathanael’s skepticism revolved around the location, not the Person. Though we often focus on the part of the verse that says “from Nazareth?!” let’s focus on the part before that. Note Nathanael said, “can anything GOOD…” This shows that Nathanael knew of the Messiah and was looking for Him. He knew His appearance would be GOOD. Nathanael believed.
Nathanael had a seeking heart because he truly studied the scriptures. As verse 45 shows, Philip and Nathanael studied the Law, Moses and the Prophets. As for Nathanael’s character, in verse 47 when Jesus saw Nathanael coming toward Him, Jesus said there was no deceit in Nathanael and that he was a true Israelite.
Nathanael was a simple man, indeed from a similar backwater than Nazareth (Cana), in a backwater district, in a time of apostasy. Not many people around him believed the truth. The Samaritans believed a blended religion, the Pharisees believed a works religion, the Sadducees didn’t believe in supernatural resurrection or angels and were against the Pharisees who did, and most regular people were either unknowing, hypocrites, or apathetic. As a matter of fact, Luke 4:33-34 records Jesus at Capernaum teaching at the synagogue. A demon-possessed man in the synagogue cried out when Jesus taught, because of His authority in His proclamation of the truth of God. Jesus cast him out, His first exorcism. Can you imagine a synagogue so devoid of truth that before Jesus’ arrival, the demon inside the man felt so secure he had never cried out before? Demons should never feel comfortable in church!
It was a time of apostasy, God hadn’t spoken in 400 years. He had sent no prophet since Malachi (until John the Baptist). God had done no miracles. He had been silent.
Synagogues in the small towns had limped along, (with demons in them), the Temple in Jerusalem grew bloated with wares, graft, and hypocrisy thanks to the religious hierarchy.
And yet, among all this, there was faithful Simeon, and Anna, there was Zacharias and Elizabeth, Joseph and Mary, John the Baptist, and the men who would become the Apostles. And there was Nathanael, who was looking for something GOOD (just had a hard time believing it would come from Nazareth, lol).
In this current time of apostasy (when wasn’t the world apostasizing?!) we look at our leaders and sometimes we are greatly disappointed. Just as those regular people of Nathanael’s time were looking at the hypocritical Pharisees, the corrupt Annas or Caiaphas, the arrogant and zealous Saul (later, Paul), the ordinary people must have felt let down by those who were in charge of leading them in the truth just as we are let down by many of our leaders today. There has always been a shepherd problem.
“Woe to the shepherds who are destroying and scattering the sheep of my pasture!” declares the LORD. (Jeremiah 23:1)
Yet there were simple people in small towns, laboring diligently during the week and on Sabbaths, attending synagogue to learn about the promised Messiah. Who was the first person Philip went to tell the good news that Messiah had been found, the priest in their local synagogue? No! Philip went immediately to tell his friend, Nathanael. These first century men and women persevered, they believed with a child-like faith, simple and in which there was no deceit. There were no layers of corruption to the faith that Nathanael evidenced, no arrogance. With seeking heart he and his friend Philip must have gone to hear John the Baptist, and when Jesus arrived, and said ‘Follow Me,’ they did.
And we should do the same. We labor during the week, we worship on Sunday, we follow Jesus as He commanded. His word is in the Bible now, not spoken to us on a hillside at Bethsaida, but we believe. No matter what our leaders do, we trust the promises in His word just as Nathanael and Philip did in that long-ago apostate time. We follow, seek, trust. Nathanael was looking for something GOOD, and He came. We should also have seeking hearts. Are you looking for He who was written of in Moses and the Prophets? Like Nathanael during a time of low worship and little truth, we are also looking forward to something GOOD. He will come again
in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed. For this perishable must put on the imperishable, and this mortal must put on immortality…(1 Corinthians 15:52-53)
By Elizabeth Prata
And Isaac said to his father Abraham, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” He said, “Behold, the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God will provide for himself the lamb for a burnt offering, my son.” So they went both of them together. (Genesis 22:7-8)
The Sacrifice of Isaac is a familiar chapter to most Christians. We study it in Sunday School, it’s taught in VBS, we read it familiarly as mature Christians, our eyes having passed over the verses many times.
But sometimes the gravity of the moment just grabs you and won’t let go. The Father DID provide the Lamb for the sacrifice. The grandest, most beautiful, most terrible moment in all of history or ever shall be, was the death of Jesus on the Cross at Calvary.
Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. (2 Corinthians 5:20-21)
Ambassadors have all the authority of the sending nation behind them. As Christ’s ambassadors, we have all the authority of heaven behind us!
Sometimes just thinking about how Jesus died for us and absorbed the wrath that was rightfully due me, is overwhelming. Sometimes thinking of how despite my craven sinful nature, God cleaned me and forgave me. Sometimes thinking of the fact that God uses me, a poor clay vessel, for His glory, is just too immense for my mind to absorb.
The Christian journey is sometimes not easy, and it is always demanding, but it is also the most joyous and entrancing life a person could ever imagine. If you have not turned to Jesus for forgiveness of your sins, sins that incur the wrath of a Holy God against you every minute of every day, please do it. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth split history. The event divided the world into two paths. One is narrow and leads to everlasting life. The other path is broad and many find it, and will descend to hell for everlasting wrath.
The Father did provide the Lamb. And He is exalted.
The Lamb Exalted
Then I looked, and I heard the voice of many angels around the throne and the living creatures and the elders; and the number of them was myriads of myriads, and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing.” And every created thing which is in heaven and on the earth and under the earth and on the sea, and all things in them, I heard saying, “To Him who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb, be blessing and honor and glory and dominion forever and ever.” (Revelation 5:11-13)
By Elizabeth Prata
This is not a one-thought essay on one topic. These are just some tidbits that moved me or stayed in my mind as I’ve studied this past month.
The Apostle Paul’s self-description progressed toward greater humility as he aged, moving from “least of the apostles” (1 Cor 15:9, c. AD 55) to “very least of all the saints” (Eph 3:8, c. AD 60), and finally to “foremost/chief of sinners” (1 Tim 1:15, c. AD 62-64), reflecting deep gratitude for grace. Source Jerry Bridges Blessing of Humility
Spurgeon on Humility “Micah’s Message for Today”, “I believe that when a man goes back he gets proud, and I am persuaded that when a man advances he gets humbler, and that it is a part of the advance to walk more and more and more humbly.”
Spurgeon ibid, on our progress toward humility: “Remember how Abraham, when he communed with God, and pleaded with him for Sodom, said, “I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which am but dust and ashes;” “dust” — that set forth the frailty of his nature, “ashes” — as if he was like the refuse of the altar, which could not be burnt up, which God would not have. He felt himself to be, by sin, like the sweeping of a furnace, the ashes, refuse of no value whatsoever; and that was not because he was away from God, but because he was near to God. You can get to be as big as you like if you get away from God; but coming near to the Lord you rightly sing,” —
“The more thy glories strike mine eyes,
The humbler I shall lie.” Isaac Watts.
The “Son of man” was Jesus’ favorite term for Himself. It is used 14X in the New Testament. We first read it in Daniel 7,
The Son of Man Presented
“I kept looking in the night visions,
And behold, with the clouds of heaven
One like a son of man was coming,
And He came up to the Ancient of Days
And was presented before Him.”
The request of James and John to sit at Jesus’ right and left in the kingdom, is astounding. What they were really saying is that they should be exalted even higher than Elijah, Moses, or Joseph, for example. Even in their own thinking that they had ‘earned’ a spot of exaltation, even at that, James and John had only been serving and following Jesus for three years, whereas Moses dedicated his life to God. Joseph had been through something horrific, and Elijah was a diligent prophet all his life. Their request reminds me of the Pharisees who ‘loved the chief seats’. Obviously, the pride in their hearts nor the thinking in their heads had been smoothed out yet.
We first meet Barnabas in Acts 4, just before the dramatic slaying of Ananias and Sapphira. The verse gives us a succinct bio of the man: “Thus Joseph, who was also called by the apostles Barnabas (which means son of encouragement), a Levite, a native of Cyprus”... Did you remember that Barnabas was a nickname and not his actual name? The Bible shows us this quite often, people’s names are changed by God, or they have nicknames they are better known by.
Saul/Paul, Simon/Peter/nickname Cephas, Levi/Matthew, Priscilla/Prisca, Silvanus/Silas, Naomi/Mara, Jacob/Israel plus there are many more in the Bible I didn’t mention.
We will be receiving a new name when we get to heaven!
The one who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches. To the one who overcomes, I will give some of the hidden manna, and I will give him a white stone, and a new name written on the stone which no one knows except the one who receives it. (Revelation 2:17).
Oh what a day that will be!
By Elizabeth Prata
To all my sisters who have lost a loved one and are facing the first holiday alone…
To all my sisters who have spoken up for the pure doctrine of Jesus Christ in bible study and have been kicked out because of it…
To all my sisters who have approached their pastor with concerns of false teaching and have been spiritually abused instead of comforted…or even heard…
To all my sisters who are struggling to be a good Christian wife with a non-believing husband…or an apathetic husband…
To all my sisters who have a spouse deployed overseas…
To my lonely and hurting and grief-stricken and saddened sisters. You’re not alone.
Casting all your anxieties on him, because he cares for you. (1 Peter 5:7)
Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. (Galatians 6:2)
Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing. (1 Thessalonians 5:11)
Jesus is WITH you.
By Elizabeth Prata
Your clothing did not wear out on you, nor did your foot swell these forty years. (Deuteronomy 8:4).
Did you ever think through the details of that little nugget of a scene? With all the wandering they did day after day for an entire generation, ‘their foot did not swell’. In other words, they did not have foot trouble. No blisters. No turned ankles. He made it so they could walk. This underscores His minute attention to their individual and personal care, which is a glorious aspect of the Lord’s miraculous preservation of His people.
Biblehub topical lexicon: “Swelling of tissue results from fluid imbalance and venous stress—an inevitable reality in a grueling march. By preventing it, the Lord demonstrated authority over ordinary biological functions, reinforcing His supremacy over creation (Psalm 103:19)”.
As for their clothes… as we read the we picture the people in linen type togas. Adults. But…children grow! When the Wandering began a child might have been 1 year old but when about when they were 6 or 9 or 12? How did God make it so “their clothes did not wear out”?
BibleHub Topical Lexicon:
By contrast, three wilderness texts celebrate a divine suspension of the normal process:
Israel’s garments should have fallen apart, yet the Lord sovereignly checked. The same Lord who ordains natural decay can overrule it to keep covenant promises.
Matthew Henry has some ideas. In one potential answer, he said the people could have traded clothes. As one person outgrew clothes, they gave them to another who would fit them. Makes sense. We donate and swap clothes today. But that doesn’t answer how God made it so that no matter which boy wore it, a boys’ size 4 stayed in good enough condition to wear for 40 years?!
Here is Matthew Henry’s Commentary on it:
By the method God took of providing food and raiment for them [1.] He humbled them. It was a mortification to them to be tied for forty years together to the same meat, without any varieties, and to the same clothes, in the same fashion. Thus he taught them that the good things he designed for them were figures of better things, and that the happiness of man consists not in being clothed in purple or fine linen, and in faring sumptuously every day, but in being taken into covenant and communion with God, and in learning his righteous judgements. God’s law, which was given to Israel in the wilderness, must be to them instead of food and raiment.
[2.] He proved them, whether they could trust him to provide for them when means and second causes failed. Thus he taught them to live in a dependence upon Providence, and not to perplex themselves with care what they should eat and drink, and wherewithal they should be clothed. Christ would have his disciples learn the same lesson (Mt. 6:25),
Henry, M. (1994). Matthew Henry’s commentary on the whole Bible: complete and unabridged in one volume (p. 247). Hendrickson.
You trust God with your soul, which is eternal, so do trust Him to provide the temporary things, like clothes. He is faithful!
“For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is life not more than food, and the body more than clothing? (Matthew 6:25)
By Elizabeth Prata
We are told to love the Lord with all our heart, mind, strength and soul. We are told to serve with gusto, and not just when the boss is around, but all the time. We are told to die to self.
But how do we balance serving and dying to self, and avoiding burnout so we can keep serving? I mean, should we even avoid burnout? We must serve with excellence, but does that mean serve to the point of exhaustion, even death? Paul did. Charles Spurgeon did. Paul even said he is poured out like a drink offering, signaling his willingness to serve to the death of a martyr, Philippians 2:17, 2 Timothy 4:6.
Christian self-sacrifice does not mean burnout, nor does it require a continuous state of emotional, physical, or spiritual depletion. At most times, busy-ness does not even mean efficiency, productivity, or effectiveness. Exhaustion is NOT next to godliness.
It’s true that Christian love is sacrificial and modeled on Christ’s self-giving, but the Bible does not equate self-sacrifice with self-obliteration or a state of exhaustion that makes you unable to continue serving. Your energy levels are finite. Even Jesus’s was, He removed Himself frequently to pray or rest. He was tired in Samaria and sat down by the well to rest. (John 4:6). He enjoyed fellowship and dinners with Mary/Martha/Lazarus, or Zacchaeus, or Matthew (Levi), or the wedding at Cana. Everything He did was intentional but some of those times it was for fellowship or to simply celebrate (like Levi’s banquet to celebrate his conversion).
We need to find that sweet spot of serving sacrificially yet preserving enough energy so we can continue ministering. We need not obliterate ourselves. The key is to develop sustainable sacrifice, with boundaries. But HOW?
1.Learn to say ‘no’. For example, if you’ve agreed to serve at Sunday School, it is OK to preserve some time during the week set apart for study, preparation, and prayer, even it it means saying no to something good that would intrude on that time. You serve at work, plus you have responsibilities to an employer there, so it is OK to say no and guard some time to faithfully complete work tasks. Saying no to something, or deciding not to go somewhere or help someone during the times you’ve set apart, isn’t selfish. It just means you are striving for excellence in the ministrations where you ARE serving already.
Christopher Ash wrote a short book called Zeal without Burnout. Here is Ash with a short article at Challies’ site with some background and introductory explanations about how to be zealous for God without burning out-
Ash explains ‘sustainable sacrifice’, and what a ‘living sacrifice’ means. Here he is expounding in a video at his former church as a guest lecturing from his book if you don’t want to get the book.
His speech covers the following themes:
17:19, God Never Goes to Sleep
19:14, Allow Yourself Time for Sleep
20:01, How To Wind Down before Going to Sleep
25:43, The Sabbath Principle
26:49, We Need Friends
2.Are you a ‘people pleaser’? To some extent, we all are. We are told to love our neighbor as ourselves. However, if the motivation for our constant movement in serving is that you are aiming to please a person but Jesus doesn’t figure into your decision making, it’s the wrong motivation. There is a difference between mindful self-sacrifice as a duty to Jesus, and people-pleasing.
Here is an article from TGC on people-pleasing, which sometimes is the background of someone’s people-pleasing service if that applies to you.
Freedom from the Burden of People Pleasing–
Jesus came to give us life and life to the full (John 10:10). When we carry the burden of trying to keep everyone happy, that fullness starts to dissipate. We end up carrying a cross that is not ours to carry. We become embittered because, instead of glorifying God, we seek the world’s acceptance—a fickle and transient way to find significance.
As this Facebook random lady said, “You don’t have to set yourself on fire to keep everyone else warm.” Boundaries are not selfish, they are necessary tools for stewardship. Here is an article from Desiring God, “Die to Yourself Without Losing Yourself“-
Self-sacrifice can be exhausting. It can be painful, arduous, and largely thankless. Moreover, no shortage of people stand ready to take advantage of our willingness to serve. Nonetheless, few messages are more consistent in the New Testament than Christians being known for our sacrificial spirit (Romans 12:10).
A lot of ‘dying to self’ doesn’t mean DOING in the dying. It means mortifying ego, selfish ambition, wayward guilt, pride, and more. It’s working to choose forgiveness over a grudge, serving others without recognition and foregoing ego, managing anger, yielding our will to God’s purpose…etc. A lot of dying to self isn’t in visible external service to others, it is personal work on one’s own sin nature; it’s personal and internal. We are dying to our sin nature.
3. Spurgeon said, “Sleep is the gift of God, and not a man would close his eyes, did not God put his fingers on his eyelids”
I lay down and slept;
I awoke, for the Lord sustains me. (Proverbs 3:5)
When you lie down, you will not be afraid;
When you lie down, your sleep will be sweet. (Proverbs 3:24)
I know, I know, moms especially have a very hard time finding enough time to sleep. Little ones wake up in the night and what can you do? Except get up and tend to them. But if you can sleep when you can, without guilt, then prayerful, refreshing sleep prayed for and graciously given, we know it IS a gift.
Sleep and rest is God’s reminder to be humble.
There is no hard and fast ‘how-to’ in finding that balance. It’s personal and unique to every individual. As we grow, we tread a path of finding the sweet spot. It’s like any principle in life we discern from the Bible and apply to our lives as we go. As you learn to set boundaries, keep praying for the Spirit to help you realize if laziness or sloth is setting in, or alternately if you are still on a path to burnout. But remember, dying to self means our own work on sanctifying our holy nature and obliterating our sin nature.
THIS is dying to self- Galatians 5:24, Now those who belong to Christ Jesus crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.
the-end-time.org 