when I clicked onto the link it said it was an invalid thread....do you think it might've gotten deleted? :waitasec:
I'm not finding it either? I sure hope that it wasn't deleted - but here is the August 23rd message, for those who have not yet read it:
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Random Thoughts from the Heart on This and That...
Current mood:
sad
Category:
Life
As some may know, we celebrate our Sabbath from Friday sundown to Saturday sundown. I do not do any work during those 24-hours. Not just because it's a commandment (and it is) but because He has asked us to and I will honor that. I know some may say we are not under the Law and as far as the Mosaic Law and the Law of Sin leading to Death you are correct. However, we are called to honor the Commandments and resting on the Sabbath is one of them. If the Sabbath's Rest is no longer in effect then none of them are and that would mean stealing, adultery, etc. would be all right in His Eyes and that is not true. Honor the Sabbath's Rest and see what happens. You will notice your relationship with Him get better and you will grow closer to Him.
Honor Him and He
WILL honor you.
During this time I tend to mediate more deeply on His Word and what is going on in the World. Of course, I tend to start with things closer to me personally and right now the story revolving around missing Caylee Marie Anthony is one of those things. I pray everyday for the Lord to reveal where she is, rescue her and bring all hidden things out into the Light. Anyone who thinks that
EVERYTHING will not be revealed does not know Him and has never seen Him in action. I have a dangerous prayer I pray that some of my friends and associates cringe when they hear me pray it -
"I pray that every hidden thing be revealed. What ever was done in the dark shall be brought into the Light. What ever was whispered in the darkness shall be shouted for all to hear".
One of the things that has come to my mind and heart over this last month has been how the break up of a marriage or relationship involving children hurts so many people. When Caylee was an active part of our lives we began to gather toys, playpens, strollers and things that made her time with us more comfortable and easier for us to take care of her. For months after the break-up we would see those things around the house and it would hurt our hearts for the loss of her presence. It has made me wonder how grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins feel when there is a bitter divorce and someone's children are yanked from their lives. God hates divorce because of the pain it causes His children -
all of them. We can get angry at the "adults" involved for not honoring His Word or being more careful with the matters of the heart but the real victims are the children. I know, I was one of them. My parents split when I was 6-years old and I never saw my father again. It hurt me. Made me angry and lash out from the pain of rejection. He died in 1997 and so I will never know why he never looked for my sister and I and so casually forgot about us. And, died without knowing how his children turned out. He stepped off into Eternity into the face of my Heavenly Father and found out that his earthly son had become a son of God. Where he went after that I do not know.
I'd like to say I handled everything two years ago involving my son and Caylee's mother as a man of God but I handled it more like a protective father and someone who was offended & hurt by the betrayal involved. In other words - my flesh and emotions ruled over my spirit. I am very Old World Italian in nature and when I let you into my heart and into my home you become family. You become
one of us and that is something we cherish and guard. As family I will fight for you and stand toe to toe with any enemy for your sake. To have someone throw it back into your face and casually disrespect that is hurtful and a betrayal on the deepest level. So, I did what I've been known to do in those circumstances and that is to cut that person off to protect the family and keep them from doing any more harm. That wasn't wrong. What was wrong was in the intent of the heart when I did it. I can look back now and be ashamed of how I handled it or mishandled it. To have someone who is now the poster child for bad parenting criticize your parenting skills for being overly protective of your children gives me no solace or vindication for the cost of it is too great.
In hindsight I can see how I helped further victimize one of the enemy's victims. I know how difficult it is for someone to take unconditional love and be embraced by a loving family when all that they know is conditional love and being controlled or manipulated. A wounded heart will desire those things but will also hate them and destroy them at the same time. It becomes a love hate merry-go-round that eventually goes off the rails and crashes. The Bible tells us in
1 John 4:18 tells us that
perfect love casts out fear. Until someone knows the perfect love of the Lord they will always fear the very thing they desire the most - unconditional love. Instead of getting angry at the person who did this I should have seen a wounded victim that needed help..wanted help...and I could have given it. This person who the world has come to vilify and hate used to enter my home and give me a hug in greeting that crawled close into my chest, hidden into my wide shoulders and under my arms as if to say "I feel safe here". I've wondered if I had been more like the Lord and less like me two years ago would we be here in this mess today? I believe I've heard Him say that the only thing that would have changed was my handling of the situation; not the outcome. Yet, that doesn't make me feel any better or relieve the sadness in my heart.
I've also begun to feel badly for all of those people who are missing their children right now. There are
THOUSANDS of other missing children out there just as loved and as important as little Caylee. Maybe the inordinate focus on her will make others pay attention to this ugly scourge on our society. This isn't just a graphic on the back of a milk carton. It's an innocent, a victim of injustice and someone we should cry for, pray for and look for. From the beginning Satan and his angels were liars and murderers. They caused the problem that forced a Loving God to flood the Earth to clean up their mess. They especially love to harm the little ones that the Lord cherishes so much. Think of the cries of the mothers on that day that King Herod had every child up to the age of 2 slaughtered in Jerusalem in an attempt to kill the Messiah. To have their children ripped from their arms and soldiers spearing them or hacking them to death. Think of the little ones that walked into gas chambers in Germany under the guise of taking a shower only be murdered or the little ones on Nazi lab tables for the curiousity of a demoniclly possessed monster under the guise of science. Think of the children in Darfur or other places of war and famine who are taken from mother's arms to be forced into servitude or worse, thrown into shallow graves. Think of the little children like Trenton Duckett who is still missing two years later and the father and grandparents that get up each morning to see he is not there. Think of the son or daughter or wife or husband of SOMEONE that is lost, in slavery or worse - dead, and their loved ones do not know where they are or what happened to them. Every morning I pray for and intercede for the fatherless and the widows, the innocents and the victims of injustice and the gifts from God slaugthered on the altars of selfishness and personal inconvenience. The difference now is that it has a face, a name and is personal. And, for those that know me and what I do for the Lord, when I take something that the enemy does to the innocents and the little ones personally...that's not a good thing for them! Satan is the greatest bully of all time and I can't stand bullies. I will stand against him and every bully out there. If there is an innocent or someone who needs someone to fight for them and cannot find anyone willing to do it...I will do it...I am called to do it...and my heart won't let me not do it.
Finally, as these thoughts flow through my mind and heart, as tears fill my eyes, I see the signs of the times and how love for one another has grown cold. Every day on the news we see the victims of this as husbands kills wives, mothers kill children, people are casually discarded and thrown into the streets, marriages and families have no value, politics rules over compassion and I see a world that both naturally, supernaturally, physically and spiritually cries out for the Lord. The Earth groans for His return and the rocks cry out for Him to redeem them back to their days in the Garden.
I just wish more people felt the way the rocks and I do!