St. Matthew, Chapter 24, verse: 19a; Those with child.

Our paragraph topic is:  (The destruction of Jerusalem) Part 5.  

Take nothing with you.  Run for your life if you are to be saved.  Don't turn back for anything, else you loose your life for death is at your heals.  Christ delivers a dire message to his disciples and to the people about the coming destruction of Jerusalem.  Everyone, all the Jews are praising their city, enjoying the sights and sounds of its beauty.  But not Christ.  He is warning the people of impending doom. 

Those who believe are shocked.  Those who disbelieve ignore, pass his prediction off as idle gossip from those who would spread fear.  The leaders and rulers of the people are terrified that this man who has captured the minds and hearts of the people is now spreading rumors of destruction of their great city.  It means ruin for their leadership.  And most horrified are those who are with child or children.  He is saying:  "But woe to those who are with child."

Women beware that you will suffer most because you are with child!  Death and destruction will find you first and foremost because you are unable to flee fast enough to outrun death.  You will be swallowed up by the oncoming horrors of destruction.  And the women know the truth of what the prediction means because they have seen and heard the meaning of tragedy and war.  Women are the possessions of destruction and those with child are ravaged the most.

Even today we see the loss of life due to natural disasters.  And those most vulnerable are the women and children especially those with child.   Floods and fires and hurricanes and storms and all kinds of natural disasters occur around the world in places where people live that do not have adequate means to prepare themselves for oncoming disasters.  Loss of life is precious, something that tears at our hearts when we see and hear of such in places in the world.

Christ was a sort of early warning system in those days in that he was telling the people what was coming that they might prepare themselves for the event.  The same as we have today, early warning systems that give us knowledge of impending doom that we might have minutes to escape death.  Even at the clutches of death though we must prepare ourselves daily thanking God for his precious gift of life and thanking him for the sacrifice made by Christ Jesus ,on the cross, to give us new life.  Believe in the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit and know that the promise of Christ is yours for the asking.  Death is but a door that we must all go through to transform ourselves to the true spirit of life that Christ has given us.  Know that it is yours for the asking, yours for the receiving, yours for the keeping that no one can take away.  Take the narrow path and God will be with you.  

Read the sign of the times! Read the Highlighted New Testament Bible and lift the scales from your eyes that you may see, that you may know, that you may find the truth of who you are in Christ. Read it as though you would read a good book, from cover to cover, and see for yourself.  Do not study it in parts reading one passage nd then skipping to another, but read it for understanding. Read it for knowledge. Read it for faith. Read it that your eyes may be opened, that your ears may hear, that your heart may be filled with the light of Christ .   The Holy Spirit awaits you. Christ seeks to know you. Open the door and let him in.

St Matthew, Chapter 18, verse: 7a, Scandals in the World.

Our paragraph topic is:  (Avoiding scandal) Part 3.    

Christ has admonished his disciples and the people that follow him of the consequences of misleading the little ones.  He has told them that the sin of corruption of the innocent new life is more serious than the sin of suicide.  For it is far better for a man to hang a millstone around his next and drown himself in the sea than to corrupt the new life of the little ones.  They are the new life.  They are the new light from the tree of life.  They are the babies of the world, without sin, without knowledge, without corruption.

But the world is doomed already.  The world is fated to sin.  The world is on the path to death and those that are in and of the world will follow.  For the choice is theirs.  The decision is theirs.  The path is theirs to follow.  And the sleep is theirs to awaken from.  For without the knowledge of truth we wonder in darkness, the life within us is dead, the light within us is darkness.  We have no idea of who we are except that we have flesh and live and survive in the physical world.  The spiritual being is without knowledge, without awareness, without truth.  And Christ warns us of the world, for he says:  "Woe to the world because of scandals !"

Scandals are the gossip of the world.  They form the basis of the profits of what we call news.  They are the talk in the back rooms, the talk around water fountains and our cigarette smokes.  They are what we speak of during lunch, and have conversations about over dinner.  The talk we have, the judgments we make, the anger we feel, the decisions we decide, the actions we take, all result from the scandals that we hear, read and know of on a daily basis.  We are programed for scandals.  And there is more to come.  The world will be doomed because of scandals.  Woe to the world.  The world has faced wars because of scandals.  The world will face the wrath and punishment from God because of the scandals brought forth for the destruction of man.

For Scandal, she is contagious.  She is corrupt.  She is destructive and hideous, and addictive.  She demands to be told and she demands to be spread.  For those who hear are compelled to repeat, compelled to spread the news, compelled to seek out another to spread the contagion of her disease.  Yet we live in a world where scandal is accepted.  We live in a world where we are fed scandal daily.  We live in a world surrounded by scandal because it is profitable.  She is everywhere.  She is pervasive.  She is within and without, in every nook and cranny of our daily lives.  And she demands to be heard.  But once heard she requires obedience. 

Be not a party to scandal.  Spread not her lies and deceit.  Turn a deaf ear to her and let not her addiction fill your soul.  For death is upon her.  She is the door to evil.  Through her comes lies, deceit, murder, destruction, and darkness.  We were not created in the image of darkness, but in the image and likeness of our God.  For through Christ  new life was given to all mankind, if they only believe.  For those who believe or want to believe, seek the truth.  Search for the life that was given you by the sacrifice.  It is there waiting for you. 

The truth will come to those who want to know, to those who seek, to those who knock.  The door will be opened and the Holy Spirit will come and dwell with you.  And when this happens you will know the truth for he will show you the way.  Christ told us that he will not leave us as orphans.  He told us that he will send us an advocate.  He told us that we will be one with him and he is one with the father.  Believe and know the truth!  Seek and find your answers!  Follow the path and know the light that is within you.  For you were dead and now you have the life that Christ has given you through his sacrifice.  Then you will know the truth of who you are in Him.

Read the sign of the times! Read the Highlighted New Testament Bible and lift the scales from your eyes that you may see, that you may know, that you may find the truth of who you are in Christ. Read it as though you would read a good book, from cover to cover, and see for yourself. Do not study it in parts reading one passage and then skipping to another, but read it for understanding. Read it for knowledge. Read it for faith. Read it that your eyes may be opened, that your ears may hear, that your heart may be filled with the light of Christ. The Holy Spirit awaits you. Christ seeks to know you. Open the door and let him in.