Jerusalem & Friends - The Camels. Now Think On This by Steve Martin

Jerusalem & Friends

- The Camels

Now Think On This

Steve Martin

“Then Rebekah lifted her eyes, and when she saw Isaac she dismounted from her camel.” (Genesis 24:64, NKJV)

Rebekah was a natural. Being she was raised among camels, the normal means of desert travel, she certainly knew how to get on and get off properly. She probably never gave it a second thought. A camel girl well trained!

On any tour to Israel one thing you really enjoy looking out for are the roaming camels. These beasts of burden have been around since before Noah I would imagine, who would have had two on the ark. Abraham and his two sons certainly had many, being rich in favor. Jacob and his boys accumulated herds of them, roaming the deserts of the Promised Land under the watchful eye of the Living God of Israel.

Each time I have had the opportunity to ride the touring bus through the Land, my camera was always ready, hoping to catch the Bedouin’s camels walking in the nearby hills along Highway 1 headed down to the Dead Sea from Jerusalem. You can often see these created creatures among the black tents of these desert people or corralled within a makeshift fenced-in area nearby on the sloping, sparse landscape. To both young and old, seeing a camel out in their natural habitat is a real delight.

My first experience in riding one didn’t go so good. It was at a tourist restaurant stop on the way to Beersheva, with its robed owner awaiting any tourist, even the not-so-knowledgeable ones. Anyone ready to give him $5 for a few short laps, or at least two, around the food stop parking lot. My thought, “I can do this. Get the camera out and watch me ride!”

Already down on his really thick knees, head proudly held high, this camel gave me a look, and stayed somewhat still while I pulled up onto his single hump, covered with multi-colored blankets and some leather under them to serve as the saddle. I was given a few instructions on how to hang on, and then slowly walked around the parking lot. Not a big deal, until the dismount.

What I failed to hear, or even to be told, was most likely thought by both owner and camel one of two things. I was either a seasoned rider, or I was smart enough to figure it out - how to properly prepare for the upcoming, or down coming, dismount. Being I hadn’t paid any attention to others I had seen on other occasions, or because they typically had a platform to get on and off from, I had little idea how it would happen.

The camel did his normal thing. He stopped, bent his front knees forward, and dropped down to the blacktop. HARD.

As for me? My head jerked back at first, and then before I could say, “Help!” I flew over his brown head. Down I went, flying head first into the hard ground.

No, it wasn’t a “10” on the dismount. Maybe a “2”.

My glasses smashed first, giving no cushion for my head. This photo tells the result. At least I could still smile!

Would I do it again? Why certainly! But now a bit wiser, and paying attention to the fact that you must lean way back, hang on tight, and act like a rodeo master when on the back of a camel just naturally preparing to let you down.

When you make it to Israel, hoping for that opportunity and provision to come, go ride a camel! The ones along the road in the desert are just waiting for you to show them you have what it takes to ride ‘em!

Shalom and ahava (peace and love in Hebrew).

Now think on this,

  

Steve Martin

Founder/President

Love For His People, Inc.

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One of my favorite camel photos! Near Eilat, Israel at the Camel Ranch. (Oct. 2008)

If these messages have ministered to you, please consider sending a charitable gift of $10-$50 today, and maybe each month, to help us bless families in Israel whom we consistently help monthly through our humanitarian work. Your tax-deductible contributions receive a receipt for each donation. Fed. ID #27-1633858.

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Now Think On This #333 - in the year of our Lord 11.23.17 – “Jerusalem & Friends – Camels”,Thursday, Thanksgiving Day. My 63^rd birthday. 11:00 am 

Roots - Now Think On This by Steve Martin

Roots

Now Think On This

Steve Martin

“It was beautiful in its greatness and the length of its branches, because its roots went down to plenty of water.” (Ezekiel 31:7, Complete Jewish Bible)

In 1977, and again in 2016, Americans were fascinated by the TV mini-series Roots, the well-done dramatization of author Alex Haley's book detailing his family line, from ancestor Kunta Kinte's enslavement beginning in Africa to his descendants' liberation in the United States. 

The website Ancestry.com sure saw its page visits shoot up during those seasons, and our fascination with our historical roots continues to this day.

People want to know their roots – where they have come from – to give them some indication of the who, what, where, why and so what questions all have had. You and I can be fascinated with shows like Who Do You Think You Are? on the TLC TV network. I know Laurie and I are. I am sure we have watched every episode!

And now today, you can get your DNA tested for only $69. When it hits the low, low price of $19.99 then I will too!

What nation are you from? Who are your descendants? Who do you think you are?

Now think about this. Do you realize that all of us must have imbedded genes from Noah and his family? They were the only ones of the human race who were not destroyed during the great, world-wide historical flood. After death and destruction were complete, these eight, if my math is right, were the only ones left to repopulate the earth.

So that makes you and I related. Right? That means my family and your family are truly brothers and sisters in the Creator’s immense family. True? Do you believe it? I certainly do.

Let’s go to the Scriptures, which are the solid, firm foundation of all truth, upon which anyone who will stand upon them will know the truth, from the very beginning. The roots of mankind are revealed in these truthful words of God.

“For after seven more days I will cause it to rain on the earth forty days and forty nights, and I will destroy from the face of the earth all living things that I have made." And Noah did according to all that the Lord commanded him. Noah was six hundred years old when the floodwaters were on the earth.

So Noah, with his sons, his wife, and his sons' wives, went into the ark because of the waters of the flood. Of clean animals, of animals that are unclean, of birds, and of everything that creeps on the earth, two by two they went into the ark to Noah, male and female, as God had commanded Noah. 

And it came to pass after seven days that the waters of the flood were on the earth. In the six hundredth year of Noah's life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, on that day all the fountains of the great deep were broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened. And the rain was on the earth forty days and forty nights.

On the very same day Noah and Noah's sons, Shem, Ham, and Japheth, and Noah's wife and the three wives of his sons with them, entered the ark…” (Genesis 7:4-13, NKJV)

So if I read this simply as it is stated, very plain for all of us to understand, ONLY Noah and his family were the remaining humans, along with the gathered animals, birds, reptiles and insects in that massive boat, who were left after the total destructing flood. (The fish had their own safety habitat!) And then it rained, with the massive flood coming, destroying all else.

I am glad these words aren’t fairy tales or Sunday school stories, taught to kids, to “convey” some made-up story about God and how we got the rainbow (which, by the way, is the Lord’s creation, not some wicked taken-over symbol of sinful men and women.) These things really happened. Read the true scientific facts, which abound in proven publications from all over the earth. And then watch TV to see how water can yet destroy today.

“The flood continued forty days and the waters rose and lifted the ship high over the Earth. The waters kept rising, the flood deepened on the Earth, the ship floated on the surface. The flood got worse until all the highest mountains were covered - the high water mark reached twenty feet above the crest of the mountains. Everything died. Anything that moved — dead. Birds, farm animals, wild animals, the entire teeming exuberance of life - dead. And all people - dead. Every living, breathing creature that lived on dry land died; he wiped out the whole works - people and animals, crawling creatures and flying birds, every last one of them, gone. Only Noah and his company on the ship lived. The floodwaters took over for 150 days.” (Genesis 7:17-24, THE MESSAGE)

In going a step further, that means people all over the world now are family. Good ol’ Ralph is related to Ingrid, who is related to Ming Sun Lee, maybe even the 43rd cousin of Abdul, from the family branch descendant of Japeth, or Shem, or Ham. Or even Noah and his wife himself. Make sense? Sure it does!

Going a step further, if you call yourself a Christian, then do you know who your family tree is? Who are the roots from which your life of faith has been built on?

It is the Jews! The roots of our tree, the olive tree, are the Jews!

Continuing down through the lineage of Noah, through Abraham, then King David, with Yeshua being of the tribe of Judah, along with the Jewish disciples of Mattityahu (Matthew), Yohanan (John), and Ya'akov (Jacob)…all Hebrews/Jews…the roots, both natural and then spiritual…brought forth the olive tree from which Christianity emerged. These are our roots, our Jewish roots.

The roots of our faith, which the Lord God Almighty Himself created, were delivered to us through the Jews. Deny the Jews and you are ultimately denying the very One from Whom salvation has come.

The Apostle Paul, formerly known with his given name Saul, being a Jew from birth - who believed in Messiah (Christ) after his awesome revelation and confrontation with Truth, in the person of the resurrected Savior, Yeshua - makes it clear as to whose roots make up and supply the vast olive tree from which you and I, believers in Yeshua (His Jewish/Hebrew name even today as He is seated in heaven), grow out of. Written Scriptures, inspired by the Holy Spirit through Paul, were recorded as letters by him to Jews and Gentiles, who had become believers in Yeshua.

“For if the first fruit is holy, the lump is also holy; and if the root is holy, so are the branches. And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and with them became a partaker of the root and fatness of the olive tree, do not boast against the branches. But if you do boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you.

You will say then, "Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in." Well said. Because of unbelief, they were broken off, and you stand by faith. Do not be haughty, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, He may not spare you either. Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off. 

And they also, if they do not continue in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?” (Romans 11:16-24, NKJV)

Understand? (as my boss would say). The Jews are the olive tree, roots and all. Believing Gentiles are grafted-in branches, who, if having called on the Name of the Lord, Yeshua HaMashiach also, believers in the Jewish Messiah, the Christ of the world, by faith are the wild olive branches grafted into the natural Jewish olive tree. And without the roots, no branch of the tree will survive and flourish.

Bottom line (part of my accounting roots lingo), Paul says that the natural branches, the Jews, in time will also be grafted back onto their own olive tree. The time will come when they will acknowledge that their very own brother, the Lamb of God, the soon coming Lion of the tribe of Judah, is indeed the long awaited Messiah. He came once to His own, the Chosen Ones, the Jews, and He is coming again for them, and all of us who have believed.

Yet to come along and be grafted in are all those who will also come to repentance from sin, come to the saving shed blood and everlasting grace of Yeshua, Jesus, and be included.

Without roots, no plant can survive. The necessary watering channel and delivery of nutrients from the deep ground up must occur for ongoing life. From the beginning, the Lord has chosen the Jews to be the roots of the tree. Without the Jews, no Bible would have been written. No Torah would have been scribed. No Savior would have been born.

Image source: Radionomy

That’s the way God planned it. That’s the way God meant it to be! (Is that a song I remember…?)

I am most thankful for my Jewish roots. I trust you will be too.

Shalom and ahava (peace and love in Hebrew).

Now think on this,

Steve Martin

Founder/President

Love For His People, Inc.

  

If these messages have ministered to you, please consider sending a charitable gift of $10-$25 today, and maybe each month, to help us bless families in Israel whom we consistently help monthly through our humanitarian work. 

Your tax-deductible contributions receive a receipt for each donation. Fed. ID #27-1633858.

Secure, conveniently contributions can be done online now through our website using the DONATE buttons on either side column of our blog.

Contribution checks can be sent to: 

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P.O. Box 414   

Pineville, NC 28134

Todah rabah! (Hebrew – Thank you very much.) 

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Now Think On This - in the Year of our Lord 09.09.17 - #313 – “Roots” – Saturday 6:00 am

The Great Falling Away - Now Think On This by Steve Martin

The Great Falling Away

Now Think On This

Steve Martin

“Adonai said to Gid‘on, “I will use the three hundred men who lapped the water to save you; I will hand Midyan over to you. Let all these others go back home.”

(Judges 7:7-8 Complete Jewish Bible)

There is a great falling away coming from among those who once walked with the Lord. In fact, it has already started. For decades, it was “popular” to be a Christian. Not so anymore, especially when one considers the numbers who attend a weekly church service. Looking around any given Sunday morning gathering, and in most churches you will see mostly grey hairs; and they are dying off. Sure, there are those churches that are doing well among the youth, but that is an exception. We give thanks for them.

After a major crisis occurs in a nation, the pews do fill back up. But within a few months, or even weeks, the “Crisis Christians” no longer come around. It is back to normal as usual. (We may still have the “C & E” group – Christmas and Easter, but even those numbers are dwindling fast.)

The apostle Paul said that in the end of days there would be a great falling away. We are living in those times.

“Now we request you, brethren, with regard to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together to Him, that you not be quickly shaken from your composure or be disturbed either by a spirit or a message or a letter as if from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come.

Let no one in any way deceive you, for it will not come unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself above every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, displaying himself as being God.

Do you not remember that while I was still with you, I was telling you these things? And you know what restrains him now, so that in his time he will be revealed. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains will do so until he is taken out of the way.

Then that lawless one will be revealed whom the Lord will slay with the breath of His mouth and bring to an end by the appearance of His coming; that is, the one whose coming is in accord with the activity of Satan, with all power and signs and false wonders, and with all the deception of wickedness for those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. For this reason God will send upon them a deluding influence so that they will believe what is false, in order that they all may be judged who did not believe the truth, but took pleasure in wickedness.” (2 Thessalonians 2:1-12 NASU)

Lest you become fearful, and wonder what is going to happen when so many are gone, let me share a little insight with you. It will inspire you in faith, I believe.

The Lord seems to allow for the reduction of numbers when He has a job that needs to get done. Unlike humans, more is not always better. As my good wife Laurie likes to remind me on certain occasions, “Less is more.” My accounting mind doesn’t always see it that way, but it is true.

Let’s look at a few instances in the Word of God, and see how the Lord chooses to accomplish His purpose, and achieve the final victory.

Take what happened when the Lord decided to flood the earth. He saved a remnant, Noah’s family of eight (Noah, his wife, three sons and their wives) and repopulated the earth with those alone. Looks like that worked.

And what about Gideon’s army, when it came time to defeat the Mideonites? Gideon took as many warriors as he had available, starting with 32,000. By the time the Lord had set up a few tests, the number was finalized at 300. With those remaining, the job got done. Victory was won.

Yeshua (Jesus) chose only 12 who would walk with Him for a little more than three years. Then He released them (even knowing one would be replaced by another) into the world. Empowered by the Holy Spirit, those twelve apostles changed the world.

Jesus also fed the multitudes, with very little. “All we have with us,” they said, “is five loaves of bread and two fish.” He said, “Bring them here to me.” After instructing the crowds to sit down on the grass, he took the five loaves and the two fish and, looking up toward heaven, made a b’rakhah (Hebrew – i.e. gave thanks). Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the talmidim (Hebrew – i.e. disciples), who gave them to the crowds. They all ate as much as they wanted, and they took up twelve baskets full of the pieces left over. Those eating numbered about five thousand men, plus women and children.” (Matthew 14:17-21, Complete Jewish Bible)

The Creator of the Universe can get the job done with very few.

What about the 144,000 in Revelation of Jesus (Revelation 7:4)? That sure is something to consider.

“I heard the count of those who were sealed: 144,000! They were sealed out of every Tribe of Israel: 12,000 sealed from Judah, 12,000 from Reuben, 12,000 from Gad, 12,000 from Asher, 12,000 from Naphtali, 12,000 from Manasseh, 12,000 from Simeon, 12,000 from Levi, 12,000 from Issachar, 12,000 from Zebulun, 12,000 from Joseph, 12,000 sealed from Benjamin.

(Revelations 7:4-8 THE MESSAGE)

There is a great falling away that is coming through the Christian ranks. It will remove the lukewarm as the Lord Himself is going to weed them out. I believe He will then emblaze the remnant with His Holy Ghost fire, and show the world Who is the King of kings and Lord of lords. In the process, millions during that time, yet to be saved for all of eternity, will come into His kingdom, gathered from all the nations.

Are you going to be one of the few? As the Marine’s would say in their motto, I pray you are.

By His grace you will keep committed and stay faithful to the end. It is going to be a battle, but He wins. Stay on His side.

Now think on this,

Steve Martin

Founder

Love For His People. Inc.

P.S. We sure could use your help to bless the families we do in Israel, India, Pakistan, Vietnam and the hurting ones here in the USA. Please give out of the abundance you have been given.

In May, 2106, my wife Laurie and I will be traveling to Israel to spend time we our friends. We support them in word and deed.

Love For His People, Inc. is a charitable, not-for-profit USA humanitarian organization started in 2010 to share the love of the Father in the nations.

If these messages minister to you, please consider sending a charitable gift of $5-$25 today, and maybe each month, to help us bless families we know in Israel, whom we consistently help through our humanitarian ministry. Your tax deductible contributions receive a receipt for each donation. Fed. ID #27-1633858.

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Love For His People, Inc.  P.O. Box414   Pineville, NC 28134

Todah rabah! (Hebrew – Thank you very much.)

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Now Think On This #198 “The Great Falling Away” by Steve Martin 

Date: In the year of our Lord 2015 (10.28.15) Wednesday at 6:15 pm in Charlotte, NC

All previous editions of Now Think On This can be found on this Blog, and on the website: Now Think On This

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