February, 2009

Nero, Mao and Britney – whose throne really matters?

Nero, Mao and Britney – birds of a feather….

These three make a handsome trio, don’t you think? I had fun pasting them together in Photoshop. Britney looks particularly fierce, even scarier than Chairman Mao and Nero.

I have a serious post to make, so enough with the funny stuff.

During the mid-60’s A.D. Nero began to turn his maniacal rage toward an obscure group of people who called themselves ‘Christians’. He had experienced a plot to assassinate him (which failed) as well as a significant amount of intrigue aimed against him. Someone started a fire in Rome (many think it was Nero) and that fire ravaged Rome, destroying several sections of the city, and damaging many more. Nero used that fire to divert attention away from himself and he used Christians as his scapegoat. The Roman historians Tacitus and Seutonious both say Nero killed multitudes of Christians. He often did it in quite horrible ways. Roll the clock ahead 1800 years… (more…)

A house of prayer is built one brick at a time….

When Cyrus, sole King of the Medes-Persian empire issued the decree for the rebuilding of Jerusalem history demonstrated that God is sovereign over all things. Several hundred years before the prophet Isaiah prophesied by name that Cyrus would be raised up by God to be a deliverer for the Jewish people. It is truly an extraordinary prophecy. (Isaiah 44:24-28)

Yet, it took nearly 50 years for what God had determined to do to actually be accomplished. Cyrus did allow a great number to return to Jerusalem, and the building began in earnest, but later bogged down, and even experienced set back. The Lord raised up other prophets (Haggai and Zechariah) as well as Ezra and Nehemiah to see the work through to completion. Prophecy and human cooperation are meant to work together. God declares, but he calls upon us to partner with Him to bring it to pass.

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