THE VITAL CONNECTION

THE VITAL CONNECTION

                On Monday, my grandson Seth came over to help me build a porch and stairway outside our utility room door. The house already has a large front entry deck and a covered back deck, but there had never been a porch and stairway coming down from the utility room exit and the insurance company wanted one there because, well, exterior doors that open into space with a four foot drop are considered to be a possible hazard. Hmmm. They are probably right.

                Anyway my grandson Seth came over to help me and he was indeed a great help. He is fifteen now, but thinks and works and acts more like an 18 year old, especially since he is pushing towards 6 feet tall. We had a good time working out the particulars of the design and building the project and I’ll have to say that it turned out to be a very nice porch.

                By one o’clock it was getting hot out so we took a break, threw a couple of Kayaks in the back of the pickup and went down to the lake. Melton Lake is really a river called the Clinch River, but it is dammed up five or so miles downstream from our place. So while the lake isn’t real wide, say 500 feet, it meanders for miles and miles through the hills and forests of Central Tennessee. The river is deep and the water cold and pretty clear. That is to say you can see the bottom clearly up to about 10 feet deep.

                In the center you can’t see the bottom because it is deep and even though it is a lake there is a fairly strong current. The Clinch River is navigable and a deep channel is maintained so that barges can pass through the locks and carry equipment all the way to Oak Ridge. Nevertheless, the lake is beautiful and is dotted with nice homes whose lawns give way to boat docks on the shore.

                Seth and I paddled, about a mile to a distant park and boat ramp downstream and on the far side of the lake and then turned around to return to our own park. Being new to the area I had been positive that the river flowed to the right, and though the current is fairly strong, you have to stand still for a while until you see something floating by to tell which way it is flowing.

                So it was when we turned around and headed for home, that we noticed that our progress was a bit slower. It took probably twice as long to return home as it did to get there and so we had us a good workout. We had a great time on the lake, but when I took Bonnie out yesterday, we went the opposite direction. It is always a good idea to go upstream first so that if you are tired on your return then you can drift along with the current and have an easier time of it.

                For me it was a dream come true, both in working and kayaking with Seth and I truly know that God intended for families to grow up in close proximity, so that they can share work and play, picnics and outings and fellowship together.

                My son Zach and I have had some great times of fellowship and we have already had several family get togethers.  Zach is a thinker and a writer and a song writer like me and I anticipate doing some music together and maybe even putting together a blog in which we can discuss the ways of God from our two unique perspectives.

                Vital connections are important in our lives. In America there is a sense of rugged independence and individualism. That, and the way job markets are these days, families can be scattered far and wide and many times they can become disconnected. We lack the vital connections that families had years ago when people grew up in small farm communities and families and church families all grew up together.

                All of that changed with the depression of the 1930s that led to war and the industrial revolution, when people left their farms and moved to the cities to find work in the factories.

                It is interesting the kinds of things that shape nations and families. In my case, our parents being traveling evangelists, we kids all married spouses we met in one port of call or another and so we are scattered from Texas, to Washington state to Tennessee… and there have been many other cities and states in between.

                I, for one, am so glad that God has seen fit to lead us back into a vital connection with my children and grandchildren. I believe that the Lord sent us here to reconnect with family and for that we are thankful. But Bonnie had to leave a daughter behind in Oregon and I am intensely aware of that.

                But having begun making vital connections with family here, Bonnie and I are struggling with making that other vital connection with the family of God. Having left our loving Messianic family in Washington, we feel a keen sense of loss. It is not easy starting at square one again after being so involved and so loved at Rehoboth.

                There is, of course a Messianic congregation here in nearby Knoxville and we would be willing to make the 45 minute drive, but it is a very different program here that offers very few of the things that drew us to the Messianic congregation in Washington. We had gone there in the first place as a result of my study of Bible prophecy. When I discovered that the spring feasts of Israel were perfectly fulfilled by Jesus at His first coming and they the fall feasts formed the outline of events that would be fulfilled at Christ’s second coming, we went to learn more and to experience the feasts first hand.

                This we did and though I never felt an obligatory sense that the feasts must be observed in a legalistic manor, we did enjoy experiencing them and studying them. We left with a love for Israel and the ongoing purposes of God for His chosen people as expressed in Romans 11. We learned that the church did not replace Israel, but was rather grafted into Israel through Jesus Christ.

                Yeshua was not only the promised Messiah of the Jews, but in Him we become Abraham’s seed and heirs according to promise. So the church had gotten it wrong way back in the early centuries when a major schism occurred between Jew and Gentile believers and replacement theology became the norm. This same wrong theology is still being taught in many denominations today, but in recent years, and especially since Israel has returned to their land as promised, many Christian groups have begun to study into what this all means and many have embraced the ongoing purposes of God for Israel.

                To me, this is one of the significant signs of the end times that this vital connection is being made. After all, Israel is at the very center of all end time Bible prophecy. They serve as God’s time clock of apocalyptic events as all of their feast days and prophecies serve to outline last day events. That is to say that the book of Revelation has largely been studied without the understanding that all of its prophetic roots are found in the Old Testament and that certain of the feasts actually form the outline of events yet to come.

                Right now then God is helping His Remnant people to make these vital connections and the Messianic movement is doing a great deal to revive an understanding of these things and to make the church aware of its Judeo/Christian roots. End time Bible prophecy cannot be fully understood without the Jewish connection being understood and that is why the Lord is making us aware of Israel at this time.

                Unless we can recognize Jerusalem as that “cup of Trembling” (Zech. 12-14) at the center of earth’s final events we will never be able to understand which events belong to the church and which ones belong to Israel.

                All of us as remnant people (regardless of denomination) need to make these vital connections and to study to know these things to the best of our ability for the time is at hand. Events are unfolding with mind numbing speed and Jesus has told us in advance so that when we see these things coming to pass we will understand them. Just as a word of caution; most of the church is both blind and asleep, but God is calling His remnant people out of the world system… to wake up and to trim our lamps for the Bridegroom is coming. As such there are vital connections to be made.