Pray For The Peace of Jerusalem

Heavenly Father,
 You are the “LORD with me”.
 I am not alone.
 You Are By my side.
 You Stand With Me.
 And If You Are With Me,
 Who can stand against me?
 You Alone are the One Who Triumphs Over All!

 
Let all that has been Concealed
Be Revealed.

Father, We Pray For The Peace Of Jerusalem,
According To Your Will and Promise.
We Pray That You Will Forgive The Sins
of Our Own Nation,
and Lead us all to Godly Repentance.
Create in Us Clean Hearts, Oh LORD,
and Renew a Right Spirit Within Us.

This we Pray Together,
As We Await Your Messiah,
Blessed Be He,
To Set Up His Kingdom,
And Make All Things Right.

God Bless America.

ML/LTOS

Pray For The Peace of Jerusalem

Matthew 6

Giving to the Needy

6 “Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.

2 “So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 3 But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4 so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.

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New International Version (NIV) Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Good Morning. The next part of The Sermon on the Mount concerns three "religious" activities that are part of nearly every world religion: Giving, Praying, and Fasting. These activities were very much a part of the lives of religious First-Century Jews, and are important in Christianity to this day. They comprise three of the Five Pillars of Islam, and are central to Buddhism as well. Jesus was not talking about the practice of these activities, but of the attitude behind them.

I have three contemporary stories to share with you today about Giving.

1. The Stained Glass Windows: My love of stained glass probably dates back to my childhood church in Boston. It was a modern A-Frame structure, with gorgeous stained glass windows. I loved them, and my eyes would wander towards them during the service. Each window had a separate glass panel in the bottom center saying something like this:

GIFT OF THE JONES FAMILY

There was one, however, that was different. It said:

ANONYMOUS.

I asked Mom who "Anonymous" was, and she explained that somebody gave the gift in secret, and didn't want their name up on the window. The Window was a depiction of The Sermon on the Mount.

2. Little Onions: At the Nursing Home where I worked several wooden boxes of little onions appeared on the doorstep. The Food Service manager was puzzled, and everybody was scratching their heads over this strange "donation". I realized that these were Tulip Bulbs, and had a great "Activity" with the residents planting them around the front of the nursing home. There were some left over, so I brought them home and planted them in my yard. We knew that the following spring would yield some beautiful flowers. A day later, a woman showed up with a Television Crew.

"Where are my Tulip Bulbs?" she demanded. "I have the Crew of the New England NEWS to do a story on me donating them!"

I tried to explain what had happened, but I ended up digging up as many bulbs as I could so she could do her video. She was lucky they hadn't ended up in the Onion Soup.

3. Haman: At another facility where I had worked as an Activities Director, there were some very big donors who made sure that brass plaques announced their participation. A very wealthy donor, who had made his fortune in building supplies, commissioned seven paintings depicting Jewish Holidays. I dutifully ordered the seven brass plaques with the "Gift of" inscription. The plaques arrived before the paintings did, and I had them hung in the spaces provided. After several weeks, the paintings arrived and were hung over their corresponding brass plaques. They were in the style of Marc Chagall, very colorful, and each holiday was instantly recognizable. But the painting for Purim came down as soon as it went up. It depicted Haman and his sons being hanged on the gallows! This started a hideous controversy between the Artist, the Facility, and the Doner, that involved Lawyers, Art Critics, and LOTS of Money. Who knew that the artist, being faithful to Scripture, would have caused so much mishegas!

The motives behind the giving are more important than the giving itself. Jesus's teaching was revolutionary because He was not just giving us a new set of rules, but teaching us to have a complete change of heart.

Come and Pray For the Peace of Jerusalem, For Our FRiends in Need, For Persecuted Believers, and For Our Beloved Nation.

"He was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification." (Romans 4:25)

God Bless America.

Blessings To All Who Visit This Garden of Prayer.

Hallelujah and Amen

ML/LTOS