Messianic Prophecies From The Hebrew Bible (Old Testament)

 1. The Prophet Isaiah. The Prophet Isaiah prophesied (Hebrew Bible/Old Testament) what Evangelical Christians consider a 'messianic prophecy' pointing to the coming and ministry of Jesus Christ:

   “Who hath believed our report? and to whom is the arm of the LORD revealed? 

   “For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground: he hath no form nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him. 

   “He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. 

   “Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. 

   “But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed. 

   “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all. 

   “He was oppressed, and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth: he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth. 

   “He was taken from prison and from judgment: and who shall declare his generation? for he was cut off out of the land of the living: for the transgression of my people was he stricken. 

   “And he made his grave with the wicked, and with the rich in his death; because he had done no violence, neither was any deceit in his mouth. 

   “Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise him; he hath put him to grief: when thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in his hand. 

   “He shall see of the travail of his soul, and shall be satisfied: by his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many; for he shall bear their iniquities. 

   “Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because he hath poured out his soul unto death: and he was numbered with the transgressors; and he bare the sin of many, and made intercession for the transgressors. ” [Isaiah 53:1-12].

    “The Spirit of the Lord GOD is upon me; because the LORD hath anointed me to preach good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound; 

   “To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD, and the day of vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn; 

   “To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the LORD, that he might be glorified.” [Isaiah 61:1-3].

 2. The Prophet Jesus Christ.

      “And he [Jesus] came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up for to read. 

   “And there was delivered unto him the book of the prophet Esaias [Isaiah]. And when he had opened the book, he found the place where it was written, 

   “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, 

   “To preach the acceptable year of the Lord. 

   “ And he closed the book, and he gave it again to the minister, and sat down. And the eyes of all them that were in the synagogue were fastened on him. 

   “And he began to say unto them, This day is this scripture fulfilled in your ears.” [Luke4:16-21].

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The Touch Of The Master's Hand

                                                          (Myra Brooks Welch, 1878-1959)

‘Twas battered and scarred and the auctioneer
Thought it scarcely worth his while
To waste much time on the old violin,
But he held it up with a smile.

“What am I bid, good folk?” he cried.
“Who’ll start the bidding for me?
A dollar, a dollar … now two … only two …
Two dollars, and who’ll make it three?

“Three dollars once, three dollars twice,
Going for three” … but no!
From the room far back a gray-haired man
Came forward and picked up the bow.

Then wiping the dust from the old violin
And tightening up the strings,
He played a melody pure and sweet,
As sweet as an angel sings.

The music ceased, and the auctioneer,
With a voice that was quiet and low,
Said, “What am I bid for the old violin?”
As he held it up with the bow.

“A thousand dollars … and who’ll make it two?
Two…two thousand, and who’ll make it three?
Three thousand once and three thousand twice;
Three thousand and gone!” said he.

The people cheered, but some of them cried
“We do not quite understand …
What changed it’s worth?” Swift came the reply:
” ‘Twas the touch of the master’s hand.”

And many a man with soul out of tune
And battered and scarred by sin
Is auctioned cheap by the thoughtless crowd Just like the old violin.

A mess of pottage, a glass of wine;
A game, and he travels on.
He is 'going once', and 'going twice',
He's 'going' and almost 'gone’.

But the Master comes and the foolish crowd
Never can quite understand,
The worth of a soul and the change that's wrought ...
By the touch of the Master's Hand!

The Bible says: 

   "Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new." [2Corinthians 5:15].

The Invitation Still Stands

   “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and  my burden is light … I am come a light into the world, that whooever believeth on me should not abide in darkness … And if any man hear my words, and believe not, I judge him not: for I came not to judge the world, but to save the world … And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” - Jesus Of Nazareth." [Matt11:28,29,30; Jhn12:46,47Rev22:17].

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Blind Justice

1. Growing up.  I grew up during the 1940s through the 1950s and 1960s to the sounds of Glenn Miller, the Andrew Sisters and Elvis. Now, during 1962, when I was 14, my maths teach-er was a little blond ‘terrier’ by the name of ‘Adolph’, affectionately known as ‘Dolfie’, who could write his theorems in chalk on the green (‘black’) board as straight as a ruler without a ruler, a true stickler to the architectural perfection of what they called algebra, geometry and trigonometry at the time.

2. Come exams.  The results of test papers (maths) were, in Grade 10,  usually handed out after the end-of-the-quarter break on the first day of the new quarter, and our tormentor Dolfie had this Nazi-like rule for the boys in the class, for instance:

   <40%: One stroke with the cane

   <35%: Two strokes with the cane

   <30%: Three strokes with the cane.

   So, after the first quarter of 1962 and after I had received my test scores and calculated my ‘sentence’, I went to the front of the class to stand in the queue for my punishment of three strokes, with boys arranged from one stroke (first) through two strokes (in the middle) and three strokes (last).  This we had to receive by circulating the ‘course’ one by one, receiving only one stroke at a time and returning to our seat only after all the strokes have been duly received.

3. Blind Justice. The pain of the cumulative effect of the first two strokes were awful and I managed to unobtrusively slip away and take my seat, thus cheating the ‘hangman’ out of one stroke.  Come the second quarter, my grades had improved and I went to take my place in the queue for my now well-deserved two strokes with the cane.  This time, however, I couldn’t dare to cheat; it would have been too obvious; besides,  there were no handy ‘three strokes’ candidates behind me to cover my back.

   It was, however, only after I had received my two strokes that I realised that I had miscalculated and that I was supposed to have received only one stroke, not two, and so the scales of justice were finally balanced.             

   I would have given my proverbial ‘right arm’ for somebody else to take my place in the queue for the punishment, but who? That is the beauty of the Gospel: 

   “But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous”. [Romans 5:8, 19].p

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No Law Without A Lawgiver

1. The amazing 'Stephen Hawking concession'. It came as no surprise when one of the world’s greatest physicists, Stephen Hawking (in an interesting video-clip just before his death), finally has had to concede the fact that this Universe is governed by intriguing Laws still not wholly understood and explained by science. 

   According to the scientists' own confession they still only know (i) about 5% of what is going on in the Cosmos with threst (95%) 'undetectable by scientific instruments dark matter & dark energy' (and (ii) about 10%-20% of what is going on in our oceans*.

*That is over and above all the plastic, fishing lines and other junk.

2. No Laws without a Lawgiver. Even a child from grade-school would probably be able to tell us that there are no laws without lawgivers and that the Universe is governed by Universal Laws thanks to the creativity, innovation and initiative of a powerful Lawgiver … the YHWH (Jehovah) of Moses & Mt. Sinai as exemplified in the life & ministry of Jesus of Nazareth, the  Christ (‘the Anointed One’) and as affirmed by the ultimate source of moral authority in the world today, i.e. the Bible  (Old & New Testaments). Some notes:

► Jesus Christ was/is the Projects Engineer tasked with the creation, maintenance and management of the Cosmos. [Hebrews1:1-14]. He is the ultimate artist and impressionist ... everything He does impresses us.

► God the Father has conferred all power in heaven and earth on His Son Jesus Christ. [Matthew28:18-20].

► Jesus Christ must have been fully conversant with scientific phenomena such as (among others) universal gravitation, the strong & weak nuclear forces, the Electromagnetic Spectrum, the Periodic Table of the Elements, Acoustics, Quantum Physics, Biochemistry and the mysteries of His Heavenly Home, yet has He lamented the fact that He could not tell His ignorant and unsophisticated first-century audiences about the ‘Heavenly Things’. [John3:12].

► During His ministry on earth Jesus Christ demonstrated His power over the elements and forces of nature. [Mark4:41].

► The Bible is replete with examples attesting to the fact that God has created the Universe, that He has created the Cosmos through Jesus Christ His Son and that the Universe and its basic laws are maintained and managed by Jesus Christ [Genesis1:1; 2:4; Isaiah40:25-26; 42:5; 45:8, 12, 18; Romans1:20; Ephesians2:10; 3:19; Colossians1:16; John3:3; Hebrews1:1-4; Revelation10:6].

3. Cometh the End.  The day will come when Jesus Christ, the temporary custodian of the Kingdom of God, will deliver the Kingdom back into the custody of His Heavenly Father:

   “For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ's at his coming. Then cometh the end, when he shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, even the Father; when he shall have put down all rule and all authority and power. For he must reign, till he hath put all enemies under his feet.  The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death.” [1Corinthians15:22, 24-26].

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The Great White Throne Judgment: Who Presides?

 1. The Problem.  All people are born sinners in need of Salvation. Unable to save ourselves or ‘earn’ Eternal Life on the basis of an exemplary life or personal merit,  all of us (atheists included) were confronted with an existential  problem of monumental proportions.  The Bible says:  “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” [Jeremiah17:9]. Jesus Christ has solemnly warned: ”I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish.” [Luke13:3]. The Apostle Peter warned:  “Truly, then, God overlooking the times of ignorance, now He strictly commands all men everywhere to repent.”  [Acts-17:30].

2. The Solution. The Bible teaches that as as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all will be made alive; and as the first man, Adam, became a living soul, the last Adam [JESUS] was a life-giving Spirit... [1Corinthians-15:22; 45]. The Bible says:    “Knowing that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, silver or gold, from your vain manner of life handed down from your fathers, but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot … “ [1Peter1:18-19]. “For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.” [Romans6:23].

3. The Invitation.  Since God wants everyone to be saved, the invitation to repent and come to Christ still stands irrespective of the reader of this mini article’s race, skintone,  culture, age, gender, socio-economic status, current religious persuasion or political affiliation:  “Come now, and let us reason together, says Jehovah; though your sins are as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall be like wool.” [Isaiah1:18]. Heaven’s de facto Saviour & Messiah, for mankind, Jesus Christ, invites everyone:

    “Come to Me all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke on you and learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart, and you shall find rest to your souls.” [Matthew11:28-29]. The Apostle John reminds us of the LORD’s invitation:  “And the Spirit and the bride say, Come! And let the one hearing say, Come! And let the one who is thirsty come. And he willing, let him take of the Water of Life freely.” [Revelation22:17]. 

4. Judgment: Who Presides? We are reminded of Jehovah God’s sovereign right to preside over the coming Great White Throne Judgment in the person of Jesus Christ: “For He said to Moses, ‘I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion’.“ [Romans9:15].  Jesus says: “For the Father judges no man, but has committed all judgment to the Son.” [Jhn5:22].

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Softly And Tenderly Jesus Is Calling

1. Come as you Are! How many times have I not heard objections (to the invitation of Christ) such as, “I am not presentable enough!”; “My life is a mess!” or “I gotta get my life sorted out and myself prepared and ready first!” All this while we are admonished to come as we are; after two millenniums the still small voice of Jesus Christ supported by the encouraging admonitions of the Holy Spirit are still calling people all over the world to come to Christ for forgiveness, reconciliation and Salvation … simply come as you are!

   If you don’t believe me, then explain to me how it has happened that, according to researchers (as mentioned on an earlier BBC news programme), the population of China is expected to be more than 50% Christian by the year 2030. Read the Bible and the Gospels of the New Testament, especially the Gospel of John; the inference is clear: 

   Come to Christ today just as you are ... do not waste precious time in trying to 'improve' yourself, 'turning over a new page' or making yourself 'more presentable' to God first; we will never be presentable enough without the Blood, Sacrifice and Righteousness of Jesus Christ anyway.

2. The Story of the Film-Producer and the Drunk. The anecdote is told of the film-producer who was looking for a truly authentic, derelict old hobo of drunk for a certain realistic part in his new documentary or movie. He reportedly eventually found one, and after a short negotiation, a satisfactory (very casual) deal was struck with the man who was barely surviving in abject poverty.

   The drunk was then told to report to the movie-set the following week at such-and-such a time. When the time arrived for the drunk to pitch, in walked a fragrant, clean-shaven and immaculate dude dressed in a smart suit and with his hair styled and groomed like a pro ... it was the drunk who wanted to 'look his very best' for the promised part ... after all, at last he was breaking into movies! 

   The producer, it is told, however had no choice but to dismiss him and chase him off the lot with a few bucks for his futile efforts ... the ‘respectable new drunk' was not what he had envisaged for the part; he wanted the real deal.

3. Jesus Christ wants the 'real deal'. Come today … tomorrow may be too late. Likewise we must come to Christ just as we are ... the new (more respectable, but probably phoney) 'drunk' is not what He demands. Do you, like me, perhaps also feel that you are (or were) an incorrigible 'jerk’?

   Remind yourself of these words: 'Because I am not presentable enough for Christ today, I come to Christ today for Him to, through His Blood, make me presentable enough for Him; when I was not worth dying for, Christ came down to die for me … to make me worth dying for!’ Make this song, written by Charlotte Elliott in 1835, your prayer:

“Just as I am without one plea

But that Thy Blood, was shed for me

And that Thou biddest me come to Thee

O Lamb of God I come ...

I come!

Just as I am and waiting not

To cleanse my soul from one dark blot

To Thee whose Blood can cleanse each spot

O lamb of God I come ...

I come!”

4. What the Bible Teaches. The Bible says:

   “Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.” [Isaiah1:18].

   ”Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain con-versation received by tradition from your fathers, But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without ble-mish and without spot.” [1Peter1:18-19].

“But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.” [1John1:7].

   “And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely.” [Revelation22:17].

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All Lives Matter

1. Growing Up. Before my father had opened his string of small ‘general dealer’ shops in our district, I’ve been growing up as the son of a ‘goldminer’ on one of the richest gold reefs of South Africa. My father’s designation at the time was that of a ‘shaft carpenter’, and we’ve been living in a bustling mining town in a stereo-typed (but fairly decent and comfortable) company ‘bungalo’ at the time of the following incident that involved three of my ‘dear’ friends:

2. The Ambush. It was in 1959 when I was going on 12 and we were having dinner when two of my friends, Wayne and Bill (aliases), came up to us to proposition my father for me to go and play some game on an empty plot at the back of our house; my father acquiesced and within minutes I jumped the wooden ‘split-poles’ that gave access to the empty plot of land and where my two school-pals were already waiting for me.

3. The Opening Volleys. Without any prior warning and for no (known) reason whatsoever, they jumped me and started beating me up. I was so shocked that, within seconds, I turned into a frenzied tornado of energy probably sparked by the adrenalin rush from the fight-or-flight impulse. I was actually doing quite well when welcome help suddenly parachuted in from an unexpected source.

4. The Tide Turns. My mother had, a few months earlier, given a temporary job to a migrant (domestic) worker from Witsieshoek in Lesotho. She had a son my age with whom I shared a name and with whom I had been playing in the yard for months e.g. some boxing, wrestling and what I can only describe as ‘African stick-fighting’, never realising that I probably had been honing my rudimentary 'martial arts skills' for this momentous day.

   Through my tears and the barrage of blows and kicks I looked up only to see my skinny, golden brown little Sotho* pal jump that fence like the proverbial ‘bat out of h…ll’ and boy, did we give my two ’assailants’ a thorough thrashing. We stood and watched amazed at the rattled pair, with Wayne's chubby little legs and Bill's skinny little knock knees (like an emaciated heron) carrying them over their fence home.

*Sotho: "The Sotho /ˈsuːtuː/^[2] people, or Basotho /bæˈsuːtuː/, are a Bantu-language family ethnic group of Southern Africa who speak Sesotho. They are native to modern Lesotho and South Africa. The Basotho have inhabited the region since around the fifth century CE and are closely related to other Bantu-language family speaking peoples of the region.

   "The modern Basotho identity emerged from the accomplished diplomacy of Moshoeshoe I who unified the disparate clans of Sotho–Tswana origin that had dispersed across southern Africa in the early 19th century. Most Basotho today live in Lesotho or South Africa, as the area of the Orange Free State was originally part of Moshoeshoe's nation (now Lesotho)." [Wikipedia].

P.S. 'fifth century CE': '5 A.D.' ('Anno Domini').

5. All Lives Matter! The Bible rarely if ever mentions the skin-colour of the various folks involved, though race by nationality ('Ethiopian', 'Greek',  'Parthian', 'Jew' etc.) is often implied. When the chips are down, however, we’re all the same of only two possible ‘colours’, i.e. on the side of either KIND or UNKIND; DECENT or UNDECENT.

Acknowledgements

Sotho People. Wikipedia. Online 2021.

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Why Sensible People Will Not Waste Their Time With Satanism

1. Do the Math. It should be a brand of logic so plain and simple than even an aardvark with a serious brain injury ought to be able to grasp it;  the same Bible and the same Jesus Christ that said that there is a GOD (the ‘YHWH’, the ‘I AM’ or ‘Jehovah’ of Moses and Mt. Sinai) affirmed the existence of the Devil (‘Satan’); the same Bible and same Jesus Christ that said that there is a Heaven also affirmed the existence of a Hell, whether we like it or not (and Jesus Christ never lied). So, how:

► some ‘Christian’ denominations can teach there is no ‘Hell’ boggles the mind; if anyone really had had the authority and power to scrap Hell from the Bible and expunge it from our theology then we, of a logical necessity, would have had to be consistent and scrap Heaven from the Bible and our theology too.

► Satanists chose to worship Satan instead of GOD (the ‘YHWH’ of Moses and Mt. Sinai) is most perplexing; for the same effort and price they could have chosen the Almighty; instead they went for a created being, i.e. Satan (‘Plan B’?).  The Bible is the only authoritative source of note that reveals and affirms the existence of Satan; if the authority of the Bible is then accepted by the Satanists i.r.o. the persona  of the Devil, why won’t they accept the authority of the Bible ir.o. the persona of the Almighty … an infinitely wiser choice?

2. The elusive art & science of inglorious Decisionmaking. Read the Gospels and how the citizens of Jerusalem, and specifically those in the madding crowd confronted with the choice between Jesus Christ and Barabbas, and who then chose Barabbas, described in the Gospels as an insurrectionist, a robber and a murderer. [John18:40; Mark15:7].

    Dismissing and rejecting the Author and/or Prince of Life, Jesus Christ [Acts3:15; 5:31] as no more than a no-good rabble-rouser of a public nuisance, they chose Barabbas, a no-good insurrectionist, robber and murderer to be released for them instead.

     After two millennia the same inglorious decision-making is still going on today; people still trample the august, humble Carpenter-Rabbi from Nazareth underfoot with their choice of Satan as their god and hero. Be that as it may, note the remarkable resemblance by comparing the profile of Satan with that of Barabbas:

► Satan the INSURRECTIONIST.  Luke10:18; Jude1:6; 2Peter2:4; Revelation3:9; 12:7,13,17; 20:12,7.

► Satan the LIAR, ROBBER & MURDERER. John8:44; 10:10.

   Jesus Christ has taught: “Either make the tree good, and his fruit good; or else make the tree corrupt, and his fruit corrupt: for the tree is known by his fruit.” [Matthew12:33].

3. A Case in Point. During the reign of the ‘Third Reich’ and World War II (1933-1945)  Adolf Hitler has had ample opportunity to conquer the world and demonstrate the superiority of the Nazi regime and his so-called ‘Aryan race’. Instead he bungled one battle after the other, especially with the two conflicts the Battle of Britain and his pièce de resistance, the Battle of Russia and fired some of his best generals as ‘incompetents’ or for insubordination only to go on and make a sorry mess of his war effort, so much so that in the end (1945) he has had to capitulate and exit the world stage in pretty ignominious fashion.

   What was his problem? In plain language … he was a World War 1 ‘Lance-Corporal’  in the uniform of a World War 2 ‘Supreme Commander-In-Chief’ who had had no training in (or any idea of) the logistics involved in and demanded by moving great armies across immense theatres of war … and the same with Satan.

4. Choosing Satan.  Sensible people serious about their future will therefore not waste their time with Satanism for the fact of the future awaiting Satan.

   “And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.  And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works. And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And who-soever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.” [Rev20:10,13-15].

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The Art And Science Of Gratitude

   1. The Scourge of Adversity. Also referred to as ‘The University of Hard Knocks’ or ‘The University of Adversity’ maybe we should learn not to take such a dim view of adversity. I think it was Charles Spurgeon who has said that, provided we prevailed, God was able to redeem times, tears and trouble; even when four days late (as with the death of Lazarus) He could still be in time.

2. Quotes on Suffering & Insecurity. “A ship in port is safe, but that's not what ships are built for.” [Dale Carnegie]. “The more you do, the more you fail. The more you fail, the more you learn. The more you learn, the better you get.”  [John Maxwell]. “If your God is mighty enough to ignite the sun, could it be that He is mighty enough to light your path? Stay strong! Your test will become your test-imony, your mess will become your mess-age.” [Max Lucado]. “If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing well. If it is worth having, it is worth waiting for. If it is worth attaining, it is worth fighting for. If it is worth experiencing, it is worth putting aside time for.” [Oscar Wilde].

3. The Tragedy of Selfishness. Sometimes we can be so self-absorbed in our problems, adversity and suffering that we completely forget the pain of those around us. Wrote Martin Niemöller:

“First they came for the Communists

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Communist

Then they came for the Socialists

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Socialist

Then they came for the trade unionists

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a trade unionist

Then they came for the Jews

And I did not speak out

Because I was not a Jew

Then they came for me

And there was no one left

To speak out for me.”

[Martin Niemöller, 1892-1984]

4. Jesus Christ & Gratitude. Jesus never forgot to say ‘thank you’. The Bible says:

►“At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes.” [Matthew11:25]. 

►“And he took the cup, and gave thanks, and said, Take this, and divide it among yourselves … And he took bread, and gave thanks, and brake it, and gave unto them, saying, This is my body which is given for you: this do in remembrance of me.” [Luke22:17,19]..

►”And Jesus took the loaves; and when he had given thanks, he distributed to the disciples, and the disciples to them that were set down; and likewise of the fishes as much as they would.”  [John6:11].

►“Then they took away the stone from the place where the dead was laid. And Jesus lifted up his eyes, and said, Father, I thank thee that thou hast heard me.” [John11:41].  

5. The Apostle Paul & Gratitude.  The Apostle Paul admonishes believers to be grateful:

►“Now thanks be unto God, which always causeth us to triumph in Christ, and maketh manifest the savour of his knowledge by us in every place … Thanks be unto God for his unspeakable gift.” [2Corinthians-2:14; 9:15].

►“Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.” [Ephesians5:20]. 

6. Gratitude on Death Row. Some say that the song of the parakeet in a cage is the sweetest and most melodious of all birds. Languishing on death row on a charge of homicide (manslaughter) and probably expecting to be executed (however reprieved after four years in prison) the prolific South African writer, Herman Charles Bosman (1905-1951) once wrote:  

“Tho’ my heart  is bruised and riven;

Tho’ my soul is scathed with scars –

Yet I’ve touched the fringe of heaven …

I’ve lived among the stars!”

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In Defence Of Absolute Truth

1. Discussion. “There is no such thing as ‘Absolute Truth’” will surely go down in history as one the favourite mantras of the atheist, agnostic, pagan, skeptic and secular humanist of the 21st century; it is one of those surreptitious ways in which to say that there is no God (i.e. no Intelligent Designer or Omnipotent Creator considered by Christians as the epitome of ‘Absolute Truth’).

   Is it, however, really true? Do the math: If there were no such thing as ‘Absolute Truth’, then the speaker himself would not really be speaking the absolute truth, would he? Furthermore, if the speaker was not telling the ‘Absolute Truth’, then he was, for all intents and purposes, actually lying and, if lying, his assertion, “There is no such thing as ‘Absolute Truth’” would be wrong (untrue) and could not hold. Half-a-truth is the same as half-a-lie.

   The consequence of this discovery i.e. that his assertion i.r.o. the merit of ‘Absolute Truth’ was wrong or false would mean that there is such a thing as ‘Absolute Truth’ after all. In the final analysis we are thus confronted with one mammoth moral dilemma for the atheist to con-tend with, explain or justify to the world: 

   How is it ideologically possible for the atheist (or ‘secular humanist’) to live with the philosophical anomaly where the atheist insists that there is no such thing as ‘Absolute Truth’, and, at the same time insist that ‘Atheism’ as an ideology is absolutely true? The term ‘Atheist’ will thus of necessity have to be redefined as, “A person who believes that there is no such thing as ‘Absolute Truth’ except for the ‘absolute truth’ of Atheism!”

2. Conclusion. Were the statement, “There is no such thing as Absolute Truth!”:

- true, then we would anyway be back at ‘square one’ (‘Absolute Truth’) because the speaker would by his own admission lying; 

- false (untrue), we would also obviously be back at ‘square one’ (‘Absolute Truth’) again because the speaker has been lying all the time in the first place. 

   In His great wisdom God has ensured that the abovementioned statement (“There is no such thing as Absolute Truth!”) in the mouth of any speaker (albeit theist or atheist) will always be auto-destructive in each case … ABSOLUTE TRUTH shall, in orher words, prevail.

Jesus Christ has said:

   “To this end I was born, and for this cause I came into the world, that I should bear witness to the TRUTH. Everyone who is of the TRUTH hears My voice.” [John18:37b].

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