Moore Heavenly Thoughts

Joan Hart

Shared with Your friends and Ruby's friends

You all know how upset I have been with FB for not showing comments. The only way around it is to repost a comment as a status. This is one I wrote to Ruby Greene and I wanted to be sure she saw it plus there are others on this group who like to read my Bible-related posts.

I didn't mean to ignore your question, I was just trying to think how to answer it without typing a book. And I don't want to start a Biblical argument because there is so much controversy about the book of Revelation. I can only say that many people get hung up on taking much of the language literally when it is meant to be a visual representation of something we can’t grasp in our mind (until we get there) by putting it in the language of something we CAN understand.

It is the “typology” part that I wrote about earlier. A “type” of something in Biblical language means it is an example or an illustration.

Gold is the most costly substance on earth in the understanding of most people. It is precious, valuable, etc. So when it is used in the

Bible it signifies the most precious spiritual truths - salvation, birth, crucifixion, death and resurrection of Christ (the Wise Men brought gifts of gold). The Old Testament tabernacle is a perfect illustration of God’s church and at other times an illustration of the plan of salvation.

IMPORTANT: When I use the word church in my writings I am not referring to any particular denomination. The word itself refers to a “called out people”, it means everybody who has been called out of sin and worldly things and committed to serve Jesus Christ, regardless of denomination, or creed, or doctrinal practices. Those are all things that can actually divide us, unfortunately, but believing in the Virgin Birth of Christ, his sacrificial death and Resurrection is something we can all agree on and the “church” is composed solely and only people who have those beliefs....doesn’t matter the name of the church on the door.

So back to the Old Testament tabernacle, everything in it was made of gold except the wood and linen and animal skins and even those represent something else. I wish I had the time and energy to post stuff like this on FB but I just get too tired of writing anymore and it would take so much time.

Let me give you 2 more examples of “types”. The story of Abraham being told to sacrifice his son and then God stopped it is a perfect example of how God had to allow His Son to be the perfect sacrifice and not even God the Father could stop that.

And then another one about heaven. Those pearly gates are meant to signify the trials and tribulations and persecutions we Christians are called to go through in order to make it to heaven. A pearl is created by a piece of sand or other irritant works its way into an oyster. The oyster secretes a fluid to coat the irritant and layers of that fluid on the grain of sand eventually creates a pearl.

The pearly gates remind us that it is those things which have caused us pain that makes us fit for heaven as we learn to overcome them.

I have done this type of preaching for 25 years over and over on these lessons. I never used notes and I never used a pulpit so I held my Bible as I stood, and in later years, had to sit so unfortunately I have no manuscripts to copy and post. If I did, I could put together a book. I was often asked to do so, but never had time.

Final word, will the streets really be gold. I don’t know and I don’t care because I know what the language stands for. I do know the Bible in one place refers to the streets as being transparent gold. I never saw any gold you can see through!

Passion

“Better pass boldly into that other world, in the full glory of some passion, than fade and wither dismally with age”.. (James Joyce) I’ve often been accused of being too passionate, of caring too much about certain things. But I believe that passion, also defined as fervor or zeal, is one of the essential core values of human life, along with the Apostle Paul’s Biblical list of the virtues of faith, hope and charity. Passionate people have strong opinions and usually articulate them very well. We are also perfectionists, and we don’t handle incompetence in the public arena very well, all of which tend to preclude us from being the most popular person in the room. I long ago accepted the fact that I won’t have the largest funeral in Lebanon, nor will my obituary make the front page. But not everyone seems to care that much about anything other than their own lives. T.S. Eliot once said, “It is obvious that we can no more explain pas...

A RIVER RUNS THROUGH IT

Years ago, there was a movie called “A River Runs Through It” based on a novel by Norman Maclean. I didn’t see the movie, but the title has been running through my head for several days now. The Rio Grande is just one of hundreds of rivers that runs through this great North American continent. More than 60,000 illegal immigrants have crossed the Mexican border in the past nine months, many of them using the Rio Grande as their point of entrance. Louie Gohmert, a Texas Congressman describes his recent trip to the river during the pre-dawn hours. He saw pregnant women and those with nursing infants and small children, and many teenagers, 72 people in all that morning and a third of them were children unaccompanied by adults. Border agents pulled on blue latex gloves when they saw them arriving. One told the Congressman that many of them have scabies, lice and even more serious infectious diseases that probably won’t be noticed until after they have traveled with others on buse...

LIQUID PRAYERS

I'm often asked why Tears fall from my eyes When my prayers ascend to the throne; It's so easy for me To shed tears, don't you see; That's the way I make my needs known. For the tears that I shed In the prayers that I've said Have all been kept by Him In a bottle rare; He has placed them there He has never forgotten them. For every tear Is a liquid prayer That waters the seed that we sow. Through the good times and bad Whether happy or sad The tears help our prayers to flow. Feel a tug in your heart? Then let the tears start When you take to God all your cares. He knows what you need; He hears when you plead; For tears are just liquid prayers. Written by Joan Rowden Hart 12.17.01, based on Psalm 56:8, “Thou tellest my wanderings; put thou my tears into thy bottle; are they not in thy book?” This poem was inspired by my dear friend, Betty Shanks of Farmington , Mo , who coined the phrase “liquid prayers” after I had preached a sermon ...

Straight From The Hart

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