He said he didn't understand "how a person became a thing."  His father had opposed serfdom, as had Catherine the Great before him.  But trying to get the approval of the nobility was not an easy thing.  In fact, Catherine had given up.  Yet Tsar Alexander II did not.  It took five years and the murder of one of his emissaries to finally, on February 19, 1861, receive the approval he needed to pass the legislation abolishing serfdom forever from Russia.  Things did not go smoothly afterward as the peasants expected to be given land along with their freedom, but it is still a monumental event in Russian history, and because of it, Tsar Alexander is called the Liberator.
            But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and [have] been set free from sin…(Rom 6:17-18).  We have been blessed with a far more important liberation.  For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace (Rom 6:14).  We have our freedom now, freedom to choose not to sin.  We have been blessed with the ability to overcome with the help of our own Liberator (1 Cor 10:13).  We might have wished we were free to choose before our baptism (Rom 6) but it was simply impossible.  So I find it to be a law that when I want to do right, evil lies close at hand. For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members (Rom 7:21-23).  Truly we were wretched (7:24) and in need of deliverance.
            It took years of planning, and it involved the murder of the King's Son, but finally it happened.  The King's Son rose from the dead and abolished the slavery to sin.  …Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!...There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. (Rom 7:24-8:1).
            And now we are free, never again enslaved to sin, a truly monumental moment in history.
 
For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus made me free from the law of sin and of death.   For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received the Spirit of adoption as sons, by whom we cry, “Abba! Father! (Rom 8:2, 15).
 
Dene Ward
 

My grandson came by for a quick visit recently.  I spent a couple of hours preparing the house, putting up the things that might hurt him and the things that could get him into trouble.  Then I put out the old toys his daddy used to play with, the “new” ones I had picked up at a thrift store, the crayons, a small plastic chair I had bought for him, as well as my old rocking chair, the one I sat in until I outgrew it.
            You are never really sure what a two year old will find interesting.  Their likes and dislikes change with every mood.  I picked up blueberries and chicken nuggets, two of his favorite things, at least the last time I was with him.  That doesn’t mean he will like them this time.  At least I know that about toddlers.  It would have been more helpful to have been able to remember well my own preschool days.  Then I might have stood a better chance of pleasing him.  All of that is entirely normal. 
            In fact, that is normal in every case.  If you could climb into the mind of the person you are trying to relate to, wouldn’t it be much easier to understand them and get along?  A long time ago, Job said the same thing about man and God.  There was no one who could “lay his hand on both” God and man, 9:33. 
            Which is precisely why the Word “became flesh and dwelt among us,” John 1:14.  The Hebrew writer says, “He had to be made like his brothers in every respect” so that he could become our high priest, our intercessor, the one who stands between us and God, laying his hand on both because he understands both worlds, 2:17.  Paul makes it plain in 1 Tim 2:5 that Jesus is the only one of the Godhead who fulfills that requirement--There is one mediator between God and man, himself man, Christ Jesus.
            So now we cannot say, “No one understands.”  Jesus went through a lot of pain and sorrow and injustice and indignity just so he could understand.  Any time we excuse ourselves with something like, “Well of course he could overcome sin, he was the Son of God!” we are demeaning the sacrifice he made for us, and the things he bore on our behalf so he could be “the missing link” between our Father and his children.  We are saying that he doesn’t, and can never understand what it is like to be human.
            The Son of God is also the Son of Man.  He knows how we think, he knows how we feel, and he knows what we can and cannot endure.  He sits at the right hand of God even now, making intercession for us, Rom 8:34, because he searches our hearts and knows what is in them (v 27 with Rev 2:23).
            I may make a mistake about what will pique the interest of my two year old grandson.  Christ will never make the same mistake about us.
 
This makes Jesus the guarantor of a better covenant. The former priests were many in number, because they were prevented by death from continuing in office, but he holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues forever. Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them, Heb 7:22-25.

Dene Ward
 

When we bought our paint, it might have been the first time I realized that every can of paint in the store was white.  No matter what color you want, it starts out white.  Then the man at the counter will look up something or other on his computer screen, open the can and squeeze a set number of color squirts into the can.  (Don't you love my technical vocabulary?)  After it's shaken the requisite amount of time in the paint milkshake machine, you have the color you asked for.  Works every time.
            But notice—even for the lightest colors, one squirt and the paint is no longer white.  That's the case with purity, folks.  One sin, and your soul is no longer white.  Therefore, whoever breaks one of the least of these commands and teaches people to do so will be called least in the kingdom of heaven…(Matt 5:19).  We do our best to get around that, labelling some big and some little, even calling some sins "white," as in "little white lies," but the paint is no longer pure white no matter what we may call it.  It doesn't matter if you grew up going to church and never doing the big, bad sins as we like to say.  It doesn't matter if no one knows about them.  It doesn't matter if we are blind to our own faults.  None of us is pure white any longer and we need to recognize that sooner rather than later, and stop judging others before we recognize our own.
            As dire as that may sound, the amazing thing is, regardless the properties of paint at the paint store, God can make your soul white again, as white as you were before.  Not because you are still white, nor because of the false label you have put on your own sin, but because you have admitted those squirts of sin, no matter how few or how small in our own eyes, and done your best to change—to repent. 
            We were all pure white once, but somewhere along the way we failed.  The only way to get it back is to add the bright red blood of Jesus and, even more amazingly than the paint store, we will once again be a whole can of white paint.
 
For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the sprinkling of defiled persons with the ashes of a heifer, sanctify for the purification of the flesh, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God (Heb 9:13-14).
 
Dene Ward

I am often amused by our insistence on certain words to the point that we are willing to make them a test of fellowship, while making up our own words and phrases which can be found nowhere in the scriptures.  In fact, the thing we are describing often has scriptural phrases that we steadfastly avoid.  By imposing our words on the concept we often miss connections that had a profound impact on the people who first heard them. 
            I grew up hearing the phrase “rolled forward.”  Imagine my surprise when I checked half a dozen translations and could not find that phrase in any of them.  Because we understand that “the blood of bulls and goats cannot take away sin,” someone created this phrase to try to explain how sin was dealt with under the Old Covenant.  Why do we do that when the scriptures explain things plainly enough?
            Thus shall he do with the bullock; as he did with the bullock of the sin-offering, so shall he do with this; and the priest shall make atonement for them, and they shall be forgiven, Lev 4:20.
            And all the fat thereof shall he burn upon the altar, as the fat of the sacrifice of peace-offerings; and the priest shall make atonement for him as concerning his sin, and he shall be forgiven, 4:26.
            And the priest shall burn it upon the altar for a sweet savor unto Jehovah; and the priest shall make atonement for him, and he shall be forgiven, 4:31.
            And the priest shall make atonement for him as touching his sin that he hath sinned, and he shall be forgiven, 4:35.
            And he shall offer the second for a burnt-offering, according to the ordinance; and the priest shall make atonement for him as concerning his sin which he hath sinned, and he shall be forgiven, 5:10.
            And the priest shall make atonement for him as touching his sin that he hath sinned in any of these things, and he shall be forgiven, 5:13
            And the priest shall make atonement for him with the ram of the trespass-offering, and he shall be forgiven, 5:16.
            And the priest shall make atonement for him concerning the thing wherein he erred unwittingly and knew it not, and he shall be forgiven, 5:18.
            Funny how I grew up thinking the word “forgiven” was found nowhere in the Old Testament.  Guess what?  I found it well over a dozen times before I decided that was enough for me to understand that those people were forgiven, just not forgiven the way we are.  They understood that, too, without someone thinking he had to improve on God’s words with a manmade phrase. 
            For the law having a shadow of the good things to come, not the very image of the things, can never with the same sacrifices year by year, which they offer continually, make perfect them that draw nigh. Else would they not have ceased to be offered?... But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance made of sins year by year, Heb 10:1-3. 
            Those worshippers understood that forgiveness in their time would not last forever, that every year God would once again remember them.  And not only did he remember the sins of the past year for which they had offered sacrifices, he also remembered the year before that, and the year before that, and the years and years before that.  Every year that weight grew heavier and heavier on every soul.   
            That made the promise of the New Covenant much more precious.  Behold, the days come, says Jehovah, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt;… But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says Jehovah: I will put my law in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people… for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin will I remember no more. Jer 31:31-34. 
            Now forgiveness would include forgetting. That weight of guilt would be lifted forever.  Imagine the relief they must have felt.  If there were no other spiritual blessing under the New Covenant, that one alone would make serving God worthwhile.  How often do we completely miss the importance of that blessing by refusing to use the words the Holy Spirit did?
            It is not that we cannot comprehend an Old Covenant forgiveness that does not forget.  We have a habit of practicing that very thing. We practice Old Covenant forgiveness when we say we forgive yet every time a certain person’s name comes up we say things like, “I’ll never forget what he did to me.”  The remembrance of their sins against us gives us away.
            Jesus told his disciples they were to expect the same forgiveness from God that they gave to others.  His blood of the New Covenant has power beyond the power those Old Covenant people experienced.  But New Covenant forgiveness only works on us when we practice New Covenant forgiveness to others.
 
Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience, bearing with one another and, if one has a complaint against another, forgiving each other; as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. Col 3:12,13.
 
Dene Ward
 
 

A prevalent religious tenet says that we can do nothing to earn our salvation.  Now as far as that goes, it is correct.  The scriptures teach us that nothing we can possibly do will ever merit the salvation of our souls.  That is how bad sin is to the Divine Nature of God.  But that doctrine we were discussing goes on to say that obedience plays no part in our salvation at all, that to obey any command is to try to earn salvation, almost as if obedience were a bad thing.
            Common sense comes to the rescue.  How in the world can anyone possibly think that God will accept a disobedient child, especially a deliberately disobedient child?  My women’s class found at least two dozen passages in the Bible to back up this little bit of wisdom.  It took far longer to read them all than to find them, and concordances and topical Bibles put together by men who actually believe that nonsensical doctrine were a big help in finding those opposing passages.  Do you see a problem with this picture?  It takes distortion of epic proportions to put this doctrine together.
            That is not the biggest fallacy though, to my mind.  If I somehow had a hundred thousand dollar automobile and told you that you could have it if you would only drive me home first, would you for a minute think you had earned that car by doing so?  Of course not, unless you think that your time is worth a whole lot more than I do—almost $100,000 an hour in fact.  But I bet every time I needed a ride to the doctor, you would be more than happy to offer it.
            To ever equate baptism and good deeds with earning salvation is to completely misunderstand the seriousness of sin, to demean the sacrifice of Christ, and devalue salvation.  Obedience can never earn the sacrifice of Deity becoming flesh, living in a world of indignities, becoming subject to sin, temptation, and death, and finally being tortured and killed by the very beings He created.  Nothing is equal to that sacrifice, or to Eternity in Heaven with God.  Yet that very fact ought to make us even more diligent in our obedience, not less.
            No, living a faithful life, overcoming temptation, putting up with persecution on its various levels, or even dying for our Lord will never earn us a spot in Heaven, nor will menial tasks like baptism either.  What we do for God is out of gratitude for a salvation we could never have managed on our own and will never be worthy of, except as He has made us worthy with a forgiveness we do not deserve.  But if we think the ingratitude of disobedience makes us worthy, we’ve simply lost our minds.
           
Will any one of you who has a servant plowing or keeping sheep say to him when he has come in from the field, Come at once and recline at table? Will he not rather say to him, Prepare supper for me, and dress properly, and serve me while I eat and drink, and afterward you will eat and drink? Does he thank the servant because he did what was commanded? So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, 'We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty. Luke 17:7-10.
 
Dene Ward

When you move into a pre-owned home you find all sorts of things left behind.  In some cases they were left by accident, but in others they were left because the previous owner no longer wanted them and either hope that you do or that you would dispose of his trash for him.  In some cases, when you see the items left, you wonder what in the world they were thinking.  They really thought we could use this gizmo?  What is it anyway?  Only one week after we moved in, we had an infuriating experience with a left behind item.
            We really had not had time to pay much attention to the things that were hanging on the walls.  Unpacking, dealing with contractors and applying for permits, and struggling to find the doctors we needed so that our medications would not run out took up all of our time.  One Wednesday afternoon we had a power flash during a thunderstorm.  Although things came right back on, we suddenly heard a bee-bee-bee-bee-beep.  "What was that?" we wondered, but it stopped, at least for a moment.  Then it began again, and again, and again, every couple of minutes.  So we walked around the house, looking.  Actually, I did.  A deaf man wasn't really much use when it came to hearing something and telling where it came from.
            Finally, I found it—the beeps were coming from a small box on the wall by the garage access door.  "ADT" it said on the side of the box in small letters.  But how was this happening?  We weren't paying a bill, the previous owners were gone and they weren't paying one.  It should have been shut off, right?  Understand, we had lived in the country where a gated fence, a roving dog, and a shotgun were our security.  We had never dealt with an actual security company or their equipment.
            Yet I knew this thing had to be turned off some way or I would never be able to sleep through the beeps that night.  Keith started punching buttons.  Finally, the beeping stopped.  But one red light stayed on.  What's this?  I leaned really close and right next to the light was the tiny word, "Armed."  But how?  No one is paying this bill.  It has to be cut off.  And the beeping was gone.
            It was Wednesday evening and we were ready to walk out the door to Bible study.  We were still parking in the driveway at that point rather than in the garage—the garage boxes were yet to be unpacked and the shelves were not yet up.  So we opened the front door.  And the loudest screeching siren I had ever heard began to wail.  Even with the door closed the neighbors could hear it.  Five houses down.  So we went back in, covering our ears and yelling at each other trying to be heard over the din. 
            A few days before, an actual ADT salesman had come to our door.  We asked him to come back in about a month, but took his card for reference.  I found the card and called his number.  It's a wonder he didn't hang up as I screamed over the phone telling him what had happened, but he undoubtedly heard the racket behind my voice.  He gave me a number to call.
            The woman who answered had an accent so thick that it was difficult to understand her.  Add that to the siren and we did not make much progress as I yelled what had happened and asked her what to do.  "What did you say?  What did you say?"  Go do this.  Go do that.  I had already done this and that.  She told me something else after that I simply could not get.  "I can't understand you," I hollered.  Then she began a string of omgs that did not help the situation at all, and hung up on me!
            So I called back.  This time I got a nice young man who spoke clearly and we actually made some progress.  He was horrified at our situation.  "Let me get you to our tech people.  They will come out and take care of you."  Relief flooded me as I waited to be transferred.  And waited and waited and waited.  For 25 minutes I sat on hold.  Somewhere along the way, the siren stopped.  Maybe it has a time limit?  Whatever, I was thrilled.  But once again we had the "Bee-bee-bee-bee-beep" every couple of minutes.  When I finally got through, this lady's small accent was easy to navigate without the ear-splitting claxon horning its way in.  I explained the problem.  She, too, went through the do this and do that business.  Already done, I said, but we still have this incessant beeping.
            "Well, I'm sorry, but since you aren't ADT customers we can't help you."
            I was stunned.  "And what should I do about this beeping which is going to keep me awake all night long?"
            "Don't you have some ear plugs?"
            Is she kidding, I wondered?  But no, she meant it.  I took a deep breath.  "This is your equipment that is causing all this trouble.  Don't you want someone to come get it?"
            "No.  You are not our customers."
            Another deep breath.  "Well, ma'am.  Take a good guess at what we will never be after this experience?"
            We texted our realtor asking if he could possibly reach the previous owners and get the code.  If the siren could still wail, maybe it would still take the code.  Then while we waited, knowing he was at Bible study himself, which we had missed by then, but hoping he had gotten the text that late anyway, Keith stacked boxes next to the wall, then stacked towels up to the box and covered it with every towel and blanket we could find and when we went to bed, we shut the bedroom door.  I did manage to sleep that night, and the next morning before 8, our phone dinged with the code—it worked.  And now Keith has completely removed the box from the wall since we also finally found out how to kill the thing.
            Security is a big deal these days.  Home security, cybersecurity, national security.  And spiritual security.  Unfortunately, many of my brothers and sisters have fought false doctrine so long that they no longer feel secure in their Father's hands.  They deal with anxiety and fear on a level that often requires medication because they do not trust God to save them.  Someone might think they are closet Calvinists, they seem to think.  How many times do we have to say it?  Get off the pendulum.  You can feel saved.  You can even know you are saved.  And there is nothing arrogant, boastful, or Calvinistic about it. 
            And I am sure of this, that he who began a good work in you will bring it to completion at the day of Jesus Christ (Phil 1:6).
            Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! According to his great mercy, he has caused us to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time (1Pet 1:3-5).
            Consequently, he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them (Heb 7:25).
            I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life (1John 5:13).
            Do you not trust God to do what He says He will in these passages?  Because that is what it amounts to when you doubt your salvation.  Either you have good reason to doubt it because you are actively participating in an ongoing sin, or you just don't believe God.
            And here, perhaps, the most comforting passage of all:  ​I give them eternal life, and they will never perish, and no one will snatch them out of my hand. My Father, who has given them to me, is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of the Father's hand (John 10:28-29).  Don't misunderstand; if you want God to let you go, he will open his hand and let you walk right out, but if you want salvation more than anything else in your life and have committed that life to Him every waking moment, He will not let you down. 
            No need for ADT, or any other security company in the world.
 
Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election, for if you practice these qualities you will never fall. For in this way there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ (2Pet 1:10-11).
 
Dene Ward

Whenever we whiz past workers on the interstate, I cringe, especially if they are not standing behind the "protection" of those concrete barriers.  What if one of them slipped and fell?  What if a couple of them were engaging in horseplay and a little shove propelled one into traffic?  What if…  My imagination can run overtime with those things, I'm afraid, but even if I were not to blame, I would feel terrible if he fell in front of my car.
            I know that is so because when I was a child, one of my parents' friends accidentally killed a child who was riding his bike around his neighborhood.  No, it was not the man's fault.  The boy was not watching where he was going and simply rode out into the middle of the street.  Maybe, as an inexperienced child, he thought a car could stop on a dime.  I don't know, but he was killed instantly.
            Our friend was a wreck.  Witnesses stood by him and he was cleared of all culpability, but he still had a hard time with it.  Over and over he kept thinking, "I killed an innocent child," and the word "accident" made no difference to him whatsoever.
            I would feel the same way, and I believe you would, too.  Being responsible for the death of anyone at all, much less an innocent, would be a terrible burden to bear.  Would there be anything we wouldn't do for that family to try to make amends?
            Yet we are all guilty of killing an innocent person.  Every one of us who has sinned even one sin—if that were possible—has murdered the Son of God.  Does it haunt you the way killing that child haunted our friend?  Would you do anything to make amends? 
            And the worst of it is this—for us it wasn't even an accident.  And in the words of the old hymn, every time we sin, we "crucify him once again."  If it made us feel as bad as it ought to, maybe we wouldn't have such a difficult time with temptation.  If we truly felt horrible about it, we might just be able to overcome.
            Something to think about this morning.
 
For as touching those who were once enlightened and tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the age to come, and then fell away, it is impossible to renew them again unto repentance; seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put him to an open shame. (Heb 6:4-6)
 
Dene Ward

Someone once posted on Facebook about "the scariest day of his life."  That instantly made me wonder what mine was.  When you reach my age, you might have a variety to choose from.
            There was the day I found myself alone and cornered in an office by someone twice my size, who had evil intentions toward me.
            There was the day I found myself looking straight through the windshield into another windshield just seconds before we hit head-on.
            There was the day the telephone operator broke through my conversation with one of my piano student's mother with an emergency cut-in.  Within minutes I heard that my husband had been shot in the line of duty, and I jumped in the car for a sixty mile trip to the hospital, not knowing what I would find when I got there.
            Then there was the week afterward when, because he was under threat from the family of the felon who had ambushed him, and because he had five bullet holes in him and was certainly not able to do it himself, I sat up by the window, keeping watch every night.
            There was the day I received another phone call.  My husband had been found lying in the middle of the highway having convulsions.  I followed the ambulance to the hospital and sat for hours wondering how my life was about to change.
            There was the day I signed page after page after page, including handwritten clauses going up the side of the paper saying, "I understand that no one knows how this material will interact with human tissue."  Then I went into a first of its kind surgery with a surgeon who, though one of the best in the world, still had to practice two or three times (on pigs' eyes!) before he touched me, and I was wondering if I would ever see again.
            Yes, there have been many scary days in my life.  But I can think of nothing scarier than this:  facing my death knowing that I am not right with God.  I will do my best to see that that does not happen.
            How about you?
 
For the time is come for judgment to begin at the house of God: and if it begin first at us, what shall be the end of them that obey not the gospel of God? (1Pet 4:17)
 
Dene Ward

Then he showed me Joshua the high priest standing before the angel of the LORD, and Satan standing at his right hand to accuse him. And the LORD said to Satan, “The LORD rebuke you, O Satan! The LORD who has chosen Jerusalem rebuke you! Is not this a brand plucked from the fire?” Now Joshua was standing before the angel, clothed with filthy garments. And the angel said to those who were standing before him, “Remove the filthy garments from him.” And to him he said, “Behold, I have taken your iniquity away from you, and I will clothe you with pure vestments.” And I said, “Let them put a clean turban on his head.” So they put a clean turban on his head and clothed him with garments. And the angel of the LORD was standing by. And the angel of the LORD solemnly assured Joshua, “Thus says the LORD of hosts: If you will walk in my ways and keep my charge, then you shall rule my house and have charge of my courts, and I will give you the right of access among those who are standing here. Hear now, O Joshua the high priest, you and your friends who sit before you, for they are men who are a sign: behold, I will bring my servant the Branch. For behold, on the stone that I have set before Joshua, on a single stone with seven eyes, I will engrave its inscription, declares the LORD of hosts, and I will remove the iniquity of this land in a single day. In that day, declares the LORD of hosts, every one of you will invite his neighbor to come under his vine and under his fig tree.” (Zech 3:1-10)
            First, let's get some basic information out of the way.  Joshua here is not the Joshua of the Two Faithful Spies and Successor of Moses.  This is the high priest who returned from Babylon with the exiles.  Understand, that meant the exiles were careful to keep their genealogies intact.  This had to be an exciting time for Joshua.  Ezekiel and his colleagues had been priests without a Temple.  The only duty that a priest in exile could perform lawfully was teaching the Law.  Finally they have the opportunity to perform all the tasks they had trained for.
            However, in this vision, Joshua, the high priest, represents the people standing before the Accuser in a trial of sorts.  There is no doubt about his guilt—he is clothed in filthy garments, plainly identified as "iniquity."  Animal sacrifices are never mentioned.  It takes heavenly beings to remove the dirty clothing and only God himself can replace them with garments suitable for spiritual service as priests. 
            Then the Branch is introduced in the same vision, in the same context.  While he is not specifically identified here, in 6:12,13 we see that he will build the Temple of the Lord and rule as priest on his throne.  From many other passages, we are certain this is the Messiah.  And look what he is associated with in this night vision:  the removal of iniquity "in one day."  You can argue about whether that day is his crucifixion, his resurrection, or even the Day of Pentecost when "the land" (Isa 66:8) came into existence.  Whichever it is, we know that salvation is coming with this "Branch."
            And not only that, but every one of you will invite his neighbor to come under his vine and under his fig tree.  To those people, dwelling under your vine and fig tree symbolized peace and security.  With the trials these returning exiles continued to experience, with the arbitrary nature of the pagan kings they counted upon for provisions, with the droughts and crop failures, and the enemies who lived just over the rise, security sounded wonderful.  It was icing on the promised Messiah cake.
            And we, too, need this vision.  Sometimes we forget the wonderful thing our Savior has accomplished for us—saving us from sin—because we are so wrapped up in the trials of life.  We have security and peace too, not from persecution, not from the calamities of a physical world, but from the wrath of God.  Our sins have been removed.  That is what we have to share with our neighbors.  That is the peace we invite them to—peace with God.  But if they do not see the joy and peace it brings in our lives, even in the midst of trials, they won't think it is worth very much either.
 
​Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. (John 14:27)
 
Dene Ward

On this date in 1099, the man responsible for one of the most corrupt systems in the Catholic Church, Pope Urban II (Otho de Lagery), died.  Unfortunately, the corruption did not die with him.  He is the first pope to use something called indulgences, whereby one could supposedly buy their way out of the consequences of their sin.
            To attempt to make this simple, Catholicism teaches that God does not just forgive a sin and it's done with.  The sinner must also suffer temporal punishment, and then time in Purgatory.  But Urban was also the catalyst for the Crusades.  He needed soldiers.  So he declared that anyone who fought in the First Crusade was absolved of all sin.  If you could not go for some reason or other, you simply bought your way out with something called an "indulgence."  Partial indulgences were also offered, which presumably cost less, and a complex system developed wherein they claimed they could calculate to the day how many of your sins had been cancelled by the amount you paid.  Although in the beginning it was assumed one would also perform acts of penance, within a few centuries that part no longer mattered.  Plus, you could even buy a dead loved one out of Purgatory!
            This is one of the things that finally pushed Martin Luther to rebel.  When he hanged those 95 Theses on the church door, indulgences were squarely in his view as one of the worst kinds of corruption in the Catholic Church.  Finally, Pius V abolished them in 1567.  It had become obvious to even the bean counters how venal the whole system was.
            Of course we know that none of this is found in the Bible—not even a place called Purgatory.  God says that when we meet His conditions, He will forgive us.  Period.  Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow, He promised as early as Isaiah (1:18).  Aren't we glad that with God things are so simple?  But today, you still see people creating indulgences, ways to make themselves and their sins not count against them.
            "The church is full of hypocrites."  In my experience that isn't even true.  Yes, we might see a few, but certainly not 100%.  Even the apostles weren't immune from that problem.  And just how does that make it okay to ignore God's commands even if it were true?  It will not cause God to "indulge" your little foibles.
            "It's the way I was brought up.  I can't help myself."  Well, Abraham was brought up by idolaters (Josh 24: 2), but somehow or other he overcame that upbringing and became "the Father of the Faithful" and "the Friend of God."  Both Hezekiah and Josiah were sons of wicked kings who worshipped idols and made treaties with the enemies of God, yet became two of the most righteous kings Judah ever had.  So now, what was that "indulgence" you thought you deserved?
            "The preacher preached a sermon that hurt my feelings."  Jesus hurt a few feelings himself and never apologized for it.  Then came the disciples, and said unto him, Don't you know that the Pharisees were offended, when they heard this saying? But he answered and said, Every plant which my heavenly Father planted not, shall be rooted up. Let them alone: they are blind guides. And if the blind guide the blind, both shall fall into a pit (Matt 15:12-14).  Jesus said that if they let themselves be offended and did not listen to his teaching and change, that they would be "rooted up," not excused.  Most preachers I know quote the Word of God.  Those words are the ones that "hurt people's feelings."  Jesus doesn't give "indulgences" that will absolve your sin when that happens.  You always have the choice not to be offended, but to repent and change.  Take heed how you hear, Jesus also said (Luke 8:18).
            And it is probably not unheard of for someone to tell a congregation, "I give a whole lot more than any of you.  That means you had better_______ (do things my way, stop preaching about things I (or my family) am doing, etc.), or we're leaving.  I do know of one who told the elders if they didn't get rid of a certain Bible class teacher they, and their contribution, would leave.  If that isn't buying indulgences, I don't know what is. 
          Even the Catholic Church finally realized the sleaze factor in indulgences and got rid of them.  We need to follow suit.  God is a loving and merciful parent, but He is never indulgent toward unrepented of sin.
 
Therefore the wicked will not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous; for the LORD knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the wicked will perish (Ps 1:5-6).
 
Dene Ward