I have a post here with more photos: Photos: Memorial Park Hike, but this is one of the only natural shots I took.

We are participating in our weekly prayer time at 5pm EST. Check out the prayer request forum for some prayer topics, but feel free to lift up your own.

You may also fast. There's no obligation or guidelines to how you should do it, or if you should do it at all. Just fast as the Lord leads and speaks to your convictions.

(I cannot improve on my previous commentary for this chapter...)

Why do we bother? If our whole aim and focus is Heaven, why do we linger on this awful plane? We remain because it’s not about our personal benefit, but of Heaven’s business. That business is the message of Christ; for as long as He is pleased to leave us here, everything we do must point to His message. It so happens that such is truly in our best interest.

We do not act according to the ways of this world because our reasoning is not according to that of this world. It’s not only the elders on Crete who need to think and act clearly in demonstration of the gospel message, but every member of each church family has a role to fulfill for the Spirit Realm. If there was one place on earth where the gospel life was a radical change requiring the full power of the Holy Spirit, it was Crete. These people were argumentative, selfish and given to boozing it up, so showing the better way was a mighty challenge, a life possible only by grace. What does a healthy teaching produce?

Older men should not wallow in the Cretan lifestyle, but must carry themselves with a full awareness of the context in which they are bearing the name of Christ, taking seriously the mission to which He calls us all. Older women can never forget that they set the pattern for the younger women, so they have to avoid slanderous gossip and teach righteous living. They will encourage family unity and solidarity, because the community's social stability is committed to their care. We sense that the modern feminist wildcat has nothing on the First Century Cretan woman. Young men were tomorrow’s leaders, training themselves to be that noble elder who put to shame the average Cretan man. Titus was reminded to make it obvious that his life was the example for the things he taught, leaving everyone struggling to find a bad word to say of him.

What would it say to a pagan Cretan master if his Christian slave carried both the power to change the world, yet was restrained and gentle, more noble and trustworthy than his master? The whole point in denying this world is to break its power and live holy lives. We are focused on the Return of Christ, living as much as possible as if He had already come to find us faithful. The awful price He paid was not to make us libertines, but to free us from our sins, from their power to corrupt us. Titus didn’t need a writ from Paul or any other earthly authority to wave about as his warrant to teach the truth; truth is self-evident by its power. No man on this earth can stand against it.

We are participating in our weekly prayer time at 5pm EST. Check out the prayer request forum for some prayer topics, but feel free to lift up your own.

You may also fast. There's no obligation or guidelines to how you should do it, or if you should do it at all. Just fast as the Lord leads and speaks to your convictions.

We have only a small bit of doctrine in this chapter. However, in order to understand it, we must grasp the context in which Paul places a strong statement. This letter was written roughly the same time as 1 Timothy, when Paul had gained his release and before he headed to Spain.

During Paul's last journey in Roman custody, the ship stopped for a short time on Crete. Paul engaged in his normal missionary activity, but it was hard going, and his stay was too brief. Since Titus was in his company, Paul left him there to get things better established.

The difficulty was Crete's rough culture. Christian teaching was still based at that time on the Old Testament and the oral traditions of what Christ had taught based on it. The local Judaizers had a field day pretending to be Christian and slipping all kinds of Talmudic mythology into things. Because Cretans had not developed the close familial clannishness of the Hebrew culture, they were rather easily exploited. Thus, one of the first things Paul mentions is the need to appoint elders, shepherds to watch the flock, since there were none organically grown in the Cretan society.

It's for sure Titus knew what role elders (Paul also uses the term "overseers" to describe them) played in the covenant faith community, but Paul was emphasizing certain traits that would be critical in a place like Crete. It's not that such strong moral character was absent from the island, but it was rather rare. Titus would need to demonstrate such character and hold it up as the goal for others.

Then Paul remarks why it matters so much: Everyone was a swindler. Of course, this made it the perfect home for lowest sort of Talmudic Jews. If the mixed mob living on Crete wasn't already bad enough, there was a substantial Jewish population making things doubly difficult for Christians on the island. Christian faith demanded far higher moral standards about honesty and kindness, making them perfect targets for Jews peddling nonsense for personal gain.

Few other places manifested the shocking difference between the ancient Hebrew mystical culture of the Bible versus the Hellenized materialism of Judaism. Paul makes a powerful mystical statement: People purified by the blood of Christ and filled with the Spirit understood the proper utility of everything in this world. There was no need for silly rules as promoted by the Judaizers. In the case of the latter, there was no possible way they could good in the first place. Their best was defiling.

It was clear that strong elders who knew the gospel message were needed in that place if the Kingdom of Heaven was going to manifest in glory.

We are participating in our weekly prayer time at 5pm EST. Check out the prayer request forum for some prayer topics, but feel free to lift up your own.

You may also fast. There's no obligation or guidelines to how you should do it, or if you should do it at all. Just fast as the Lord leads and speaks to your convictions.

From here: Archaeologists make 'biblical discovery' as they identify possible 'Promised Land' reached by Moses


Most of the article text is below, but the page at the link isn't too riddled with ads like some news sites. 

I was hoping there would be some information about the desert wandering prior to the Canaanite settlement, since there's not a lot of archaeology on that. Zanoah is in Israael, butting right up against the West Bank, which isn't not terribly close to where the wanderings occurred. The closest the wanderings came is probably somewhere in the Desert of Zin, but that's too far west. Interesting read, nonetheless.

I usually post these in the Miscellaneous part of the forum, but these little bits of history news feel more at home in the more "official" section.

Quote:Evidence of a Biblical city have been found by archaeologists as experts unveil secrets about the story of Moses leading the Israelites to the "Promised Land".

Findings released by the Israeli Antiquities Authority, reveal artefacts such as stone walls and pottery from Zanoah - a town mentioned in the Old Testament.

The items date back more than 3,200 years, which coincides with the Bible when it stated that the Israelites reached the Promised Land - known as Canaan - around 1406 to 1407 BC.

More evidence of the Biblical story of Moses was also uncovered when a broken jar handle with the name of a king described in the Holy Book was found.

Teams located walls with rows of large, white rocks, which they believed were retaining walls for farming terraces.

The terraces were reportedly used to make level areas for planting and to protect steeper soil from erosion.

A piece of pottery which read "of the King," was thought to be in honour of King Hezekiah's reign in Judah in 701 BC.

Around 20 per cent of fragments found, date back to a period that Israelites were said to have arrived, while the remaining pieces are from over the next 900 years.

Before I joined the call last-last time, I took this photo on the Wetlands trail I was huffing. It's all very tree-ish but there's a few spots like this one where there was a clearing.

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In the previous chapter, Paul referred to his otherworldly focus that carried him through persecutions. He belonged to Heaven, not this world. No human agency could take his life until the Lord was ready. Paul was eager to go, but ready to stay until he had completed his mission for the Father's glory. Thus, he was ready to endure anything that life could throw at him until it was finished.

That mission was the gospel. He urged Timothy to press the message as the ultimate priority of life. It was the message that included facing persecution and not caring too much for this world. He refers to audiences seeking to have their "ears scratched" like most domesticated animals. For that very reason, it's easy to quote this passage out of context.

The Judaizers and Gnostics shared one trait: an expectation that they could teach some path to conquer this world, not to overcome it. They promoted a way to gain some secret advantage over other people, as if winning this world was worth anything. Paul taught about how to escape its grip. People love hearing how wonderful they are; they love hearing how their human powers of reasoning could make them rulers. Paul taught about how to be ruled by the Holy Spirit.

The gospel was not an easy message, but by God's divine power, the soul can be opened to receive it. Paul was ready to end his life in one final sacrifice for his Lord. He shared some personal notes about those who abandoned him, those who served alongside in other places, and whom he would like to see again before it was over, to include Timothy. He also mentions one particular enemy. There are other personal notes.

Nothing could harm his eternal inheritance. He faced his demise with joy and confidence.

Prayer for a  childhood friend she is in heart failure and will be going in for a heart procedure on the 25th.