Free Will. That built in method Father God gave us to help us decide who we are.
Look that up in the Bible and you will find - absolutely nothing.
And that odd, obscure story of Jonah.
Jonah came to fame before the boat, the storm, popular acclaim and the whale.
Jeroboam II King of Israel reigned forty-one years.
Proving the rain falls on the just and the unjust.
However Jeroboam II was the same as Jeroboam I:
2 Kings 14
24 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord and did not turn away from any of the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he had caused Israel to commit.
25 He was the one who restored the boundaries of Israel from Lebo Hamath to the Dead Sea,[ in accordance with the word of the Lord, the God of Israel, spoken through his servant Jonah son of Amittai, the prophet from Gath Hepher.
26 The Lord had seen how bitterly everyone in Israel, whether slave or free, was suffering;[f] there was no one to help them. 27 And since the Lord had not said he would blot out the name of Israel from under heaven, he saved them by the hand of Jeroboam son of Jehoash.
His Successor?
29 And Zechariah his son succeeded him as king.
Skip a few years and we have Zechariah again.
So far we are not proving Free Will. But the opposite.
GOD' WILL. God says His Name is "I Am."
Jeremiah, said, he couldn't do the will of God. He did!
Paul asked Jesus to look away, He was a sinner. He did God's Will.
Need another free will story?
Joseph of Jacob and the multicolored cape.
Winston Churchill went on to say this:
History is written by the victors.
Which is exactly what my English Professor, in 2nd Semester English Literature, said to me. The Bible is a collection of "suuuure". And she used the invisible, untrue, fake Hittite Empire. I went up after class, because I love to discuss the Bible and, particularly, Jesus. We had a lovely conversation where she and I were most kind and did disagree. I was stumped - I had no clue the Hittites never existed. Low and behold two weeks later the headlines of The Dallas Morning News found - The Library of the Entire Hittite Nation intact. Which, I betcha, lead to Hollywood adding to Indiana Jones.
And the Hittite Papyrus sealed in containers like the Dead Sea Essenes - were proof the Bible actually is written by Thee Victor, Who Never Lies.
(PS Indiana Jones, Jeremiah wrote the Babylonian Exiles as he was free. Later 2 Maccabees 2:4-9- The Ark is on Mt. Nebo and is well hidden and sealed by God Himself)
(The Rest of the College English Literature Story is I felt so comfortable speaking with my College Professor, I left a message with her office about The Dallas Morning News Article. She was out of town, but when the grades arrived I was pleased to find I had an A on my paper and for the semester.)
Ok another Free Will Example. Ok, Two Examples.
Daniel and Ezekiel.
Daniel sounds like he is fun. Your Sunday School or you want to know Daniel. The Holy Spirit manifests this in Daniel. Perhaps we like Daniel for this very reason...
Daniel 1
9 Now God had caused the official to show favor and compassion to Daniel
Ok, Free Will???
Daniel 1
2 And the Lord delivered Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand, along with some of the articles from the temple of God. These he carried off to the temple of his god in Babylonia and put in the treasure house of his god.
Ezekiel was also carried off. Ezekiel - son of Buzzi. This Dude was making faith part of all the exiles lives. Taking the boundaries given to him and making The Way, The Truth, The Life.
Boundaries...
Nebuchadnezzar II named his son Am-el Marduk.
Nebuchadnezzar, grew up in the Assyrian Empire where Jonah has caused a spark, a Light - of interest in the Hebrew God "I Am" and his messengers, His archangels are all called El - therefore Am-El was his son. Nebuchadnezzar had read Isaiah and believed he had found - himself - in God's Word.
Isaiah 14
12“How you are fallen from heaven,
O Day Star, son of Dawn!
How you are cut down to the ground,
you who laid the nations low!
13You said in your heart,
‘I will ascend to heaven;
above the stars of God
I will set my throne on high;
I will sit on the mount of assembly
in the far reaches of the north;c
14I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.’
15But you are brought down to Sheol,
to the far reaches of the pit.
16Those who see you will stare at you
and ponder over you:
‘Is this the man who made the earth tremble,
who shook kingdoms,
17who made the world like a desert
and overthrew its cities,
who did not let his prisoners go home?’
18All the kings of the nations lie in glory,
each in his own tomb.
Daniel, I am sure, loved being anointed by God in his own boundaries - however the lions were a bit much.
And Nebuchadnezzar found the Living Power in God's Word as he suffered and recovered. A characteristic of believers.
Boundaries and Miracles.
Now this is the part where we discover ourselves in the Living Water's of God.
Guideposts reports:
For two decades, Mary Ann Franco was blind. Until an accident helped her see. Mary Ann was blind for 20 years and found she needed surgery. When she woke up - she found her boundaries had changed. She was no longer blind. In fact, all her life she had been color blind and now could see color for the First Time.
Seeing her grandchildren for the first time.
This tells us, today, our boundaries are in the hands of God Himself.
Do we need another example. A living example of God's Word Today about Free Will???
Almost every week Joel Olsteen tells his Lakewood Church in Houston, Texas and his television congregation This:
We all work in jobs, situations, care taking, tight economies that are tight and ill fitting. Times that require this!
Romans 5
3We can rejoice, too, when we run into problems and trials, for we know that they help us develop endurance. 4And endurance develops strength of character, and character strengthens our confident hope of salvation. 5And this hope will not lead to disappointment. For we know how dearly God loves us, because he has given us the Holy Spirit to fill our hearts with his love.
6 When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners.
Because God wants to save the world in Jesus Christ. We hope for the Blessing of God Himself. Knowing that in our problems, trials, endurance, character, we find God's Love
and discover His Will for Today - Is Making Us Stronger. His Will is Good.
So life leaves us in tight corners.
What if Mary had said, " No WAY. I have a choice."
This is where we just acknowledge - we are in His care. Hopeless to always arrive at change. Proving Einstein wrote the same mathematical formulas again and again and again to arrive at boundary change, in God's Time.
We find Free Will. This is what God says about Free Will.
Joshua was Centered in God: Waiting 40 years to do His Will.
Joshua 24:15
Choose this day whom you will serve,
whether the gods your fathers served in the region beyond the River, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.
But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.
Proverbs 16:9
The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.
Being like Pope John Paul II, Pappa! The Catholic Pappa said, "We are the Easter People", who ask Jesus to dwell, to live and move and have His Being in our souls:
John 1:12-13
But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God.
Remembering like Billy Graham, Father God has seen our last chapter and this turns out Very Well!
Revelation 3:20
Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.
Our Free Will is finding
His Will is our Hope and Future.
We do not serve a God who is disappointed in us. We serve a God who tells us we do a flawed Ultimate for His Highness, in in our, just, Love We Hold for Jesus - God is going to Run to Us.
How does God feel about YOU - You who Love Jesus?
When YOU Believe in Your Heart Jesus is Your Love. Your God. Your Savior.
2 Corinthians 1:14
as you have already understood us in part, so that you may boast of us just as we will boast of you in the day of our Lord Jesus.
1 Thessalonians 2:
for a short time, in person not in heart, we endeavored the more eagerly and with great desire to see you face to face, 18because we wanted to come to you—
19 For what is our hope or joy or crown of boasting before our Lord Jesus at his coming? Is it not you? 20 For you are our glory and joy.
Feel free to Love the Lord Your God with all Your Heart.
Father God,
We live in a time where people fall from faith and hope and joy. Muck surrounds us. When we lift our heads, muckety mucks say we fail at life, hope, and faith with attitudes. The culture hopes to throw muck on our loved ones, on our families. We live lifting our faces up to Jesus.
Help us each day to know like Max Lucado says "Father God would put our refrigerator art on His refrigerator."
To feel the certainty that Father God would Run to Lift us.
The Thanksgiving, The Great GLORY OF OUR FATHER GOD
Bring the whole blessing God saves The World in Jesus our Hero.
His unending, never diminishing storehouse, where all things are possible.
The test God gives us to Believe Jesus in our Hearts and Profess His Blessing of Salvation with our Mouths.
For us. For you, for you, His Child by His own Will, His own Call. Jesus will open the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows.
In this Blessing, let us pray for those we Love. For the People He has given us. And be filled Loving them with Peace, Joy, Comfort, Gentleness, Patience, Encouragement, Tenderness, Diligence, Dignity, Self Control. Seeing the Good in others and holding them to Jesus.
And this Holy Spirit goodness sweeps our homes, the hope we have for the future, our words of Life. This Love brings forth fathers, to families, to Churches, to Communities, to Cities, to States and His Love covers the Nation to be a Light to the World.
Because in our Love Jesus has for us, we have encouragement to Love and Hope.
Let your Words pick Life.
Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him, for he is your life and length of days, that you may dwell in the land that the Lord swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them.
Our Blessing is in You, Jesus Christ. Our Strength.
Amen and Alleluia.
♔ Lord Jesus Saves! †
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