November 17

"As the Jews had departed from God, faith had grown dim, and hope had well-nigh ceased to illuminate the future. The words of the prophets were un-comprehended. To the masses of the people, death was a dread mystery; beyond was uncertainty and gloom. It was not alone the wailing of the mothers of Bethlehem, but the cry from the great heart of humanity, that was borne to the prophet across the centuries,--the voice heard in Ramah, "lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not." Matt. 2:18. In "the region and shadow of death," men sat un-solaced. With longing eyes they looked for the coming of the Deliverer, when the darkness should be dispelled, and the mystery of the future should be made plain."

Desire of Ages, page 32 from the chapter, 'The fulness of the time'

So you like maths? Well, at least one of here likes Maths. The most basic introduction is this. One plus one always equals two. We can now jump a little further into rather more advanced maths. Let’s try algebra. Using the same sum we would have to recognise that a + a = 2.

Instead of using numbers we can use letters as though they were numbers. We can use this basic introduction to algebra in the short paragraph above.

Departure from faith = lamenting and weeping + life is a mystery

If you depart from faith then life becomes a great mystery, pain increases and misery increases. That was the case during the time of Christ. When the children were slaughtered by the Roman troops there was weeping and wailing, not just from sadness but because people had no idea why such a terrible event had happened.

There is a further development in store. There is another side to the paragraph. If you look for the coming of the Deliverer darkness will be dispelled and the future will be made plain. Put that as a simple equation we get this.

Look for coming of the Deliverer = Plain future revealed and darkness dispelled

There is a Bible verse I would love you to learn this week. We are to look for the coming in glory of Jesus Christ. Think of the peace.

^“For the grace of God has appeared that offers salvation to all people. It teaches us to say ‘No’ to ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in this present age, while we wait for the blessed hope – the appearing of the glory of our great God and Saviour, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all wickedness and to purify for himself a people that are his very own, eager to do what is good.”

Titus 2:11-14

Housekeeping details for you

The point of this short blog will become clear if you decide to use this reading in the way we intend it. Netherfield Seventh-day Adventist Church believes in healthy churches. You can see what that means if you head to the relevant Healthy Churches page of the website. We also want other churches to be healthy. That means you can join in our campaign to create healthy churches, with healthy people serving the people in those churches.

A healthy church is one where Jesus comes first. A healthy church is one where the people work together to put Jesus first. One thing we are doing is to join people together to spread that news. I would like you to look at our prayer partners page. This will explain how we want you to use this short devotional. Very basically we want you to find a like-minded Christian friend who you will join with to : choose to pray together every day, decide together on a way to serve other people together, to help them grow as Christians - and to invite the Holy Spirit into your life every day. This blog that you will receive every day simply gives a common spiritual purpose. If you are a newcomer and want to join the blog with this object in mind click here

From October 21st this site will continue going through 'Desire of Ages' - but begin to advance rather faster than one paragraph at a time.

Our sister site, at the Upper Room, will progress at a rather slower pace - one paragraph at a time. If you want to head to our sister site for the slower trip through an excellent book you will eventually follow a link to the Upper Room. This will start on October 21st.