Year 2 Day 233

Year 2 Day 233


Pray (ACts)


Read - 1 Samuel 6:7-12


Message - Alan Burke 


I know a little about farming, and I emphasis a little. On reading this I just wanted to make sure so I lifted the phone and phoned a farmer. Here’s the what I was told about what the priests and diviner’s and what they had told their leaders to do “that’s daft”. I thought that but believe me it’s better to check these things with people that know than spout some nonsense.


Here’s the thing, no cow is going to want to leave its calf, you don’t want to get between a cow and its calf either even if they don’t have horns and these cows would have had horns, they have very hard heads. The cow is going to want to go to its calf because the cow is going to want to give it’s milk to the calf, the cow needs milked, it’s painful if they aren’t milked. Neither do you yoke two animals who have never been yoked before, it’s just a bad idea, they are going to be pulling in different directions, they are going to want out of the yoke, all of this is just stupid. 


Nonetheless they do it, they make a new cart so that it wouldn’t contaminate the ark with what ever it had been used for before, attached to the yoked cows who’ve just had their calfs taken from them, put in the gold tumours and the rats, and send it off. They knew that the cows wouldn’t have wanted to leave, that they wouldn’t have left, that this wasn’t going to work, that is unless the Lord himself did it, the Lord himself directed them to leave, and to go towards Beth Shemesh. And the cows went towards Beth Shemesh, they didn’t veer of course, they didn’t need to be led, they just continued on, it did the trick, they had went straight to Beth Shemesh, the rulers of the Philistines had a clear sign that the Lord God had done this, their desolation and affliction was his doing and now hopefully in the past. 


What we learn though is that the Philistines understanding of God was so limited. For if they knew the Lord they wouldn’t be sending him golden tumours and rats, it wouldn’t have taken them seven months to get themselves in gear, they would have seen with the slaying of Dagon that the Lord the God of the Israelites was indeed the living and true God and their gods were worthless. They knew some stuff though, they knew what happened in Egypt, but to say the least they are confused about who God. 


The culture around us is the same, many people think they knew about God but their understand is limited and to say the least they are confused about even the most basic things of God. Today biblical literacy is falling, people think they know everything they need to, they have gleaned enough to know that they don’t really want God and that Christians are just weirdo’s, but they are in the main ignorant, they know about Jesus, the name, that he’s something to do with Christianity but that’s it. And this culture just like Philistines want to moving further from God. Before you become totally deflated, notice how God was able to return the ark all by himself. God can achieve his purposes without our help, in a world that doesn’t want him, God still reigns, he has set His King to rule over all and the One enthroned in heaven laughs as the people plot in vain (Ps 2:1-4)


Pray (acTS)


Sing


WSC
Q2 What rule hath God given to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him?
The Word of God, which is contained in the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments, (2 Tim. 3:16, Eph. 2:20) is the only rule to direct us how we may glorify and enjoy him. (1 John 1:3–4)
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