Refiner’s Fire

Our Pastor emailed this to me this morning, and I thought that it was too beautiful not to share. I hope that you enjoy it as much as I did.

Malachi 3:3 says: “He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver.“

This verse puzzled some women in a Bible study and they wondered what this statement meant about the character and nature of God.
One of the women offered to find out the process of refining silver and get back to the group at their next Bible Study.
That week, the woman called a silversmith and made an appointment to watch him at work. She didn’t mention anything about the reason for her interest beyond her curiosity about the process of refining silver.
As she watched the silversmith, he held a piece of silver over the fire and let it heat up. He explained that in refining silver, one needed to hold the silver in the middle of the fire where the flames were hottest as to burn away all the impurities.
The woman thought about God holding us in such a hot spot then she thought again about the verse that says: “He sits as a refiner and purifier of silver.”
She asked the silversmith if it was true that he had to sit there in front of the fire the whole time the silver was being refined.
The man answered that yes, he not only had to sit there holding the silver, but he had to keep his eyes on the silver the entire time it was in the fire.
If the silver was left a moment too long in the flames, it would be destroyed.
The woman was silent for a moment. Then she asked the silversmith, “How do you know when the silver is fully refined?”
He smiled at her and answered, “Oh, that’s easy – when I see my image in it.”
If today you are feeling the heat of the fire, remember that God has His eye on you and will keep watching you until He sees His image in you.

For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
1 Corinthians 13:12

Mary had a Little Lamb

I have never read “Mary had a Little Lamb” written like this before – have you?

Mary had a little lamb,
His fleece was white as snow,
And everywhere that Mary went,
The Lamb was sure to go.
He followed her to school each day,
‘Twasn’t even in the rule.
He made the children laugh and play,
To see a Lamb at school.
And then the rules all changed one day,
Illegal it became,
To bring the Lamb of God to school,
Or even speak His name.
Everyday got worse and worse,
And days turned into years.
Instead of hearing children laugh,
We heard gunshots and tears.
What must we do to stop the crime,
That’s in our schools today?
Let’s let the Lamb come back to school,
And teach our kids to pray.

Of Fur Bunnies and Pianos

This morning, when I awoke my son, daughter and husband had already completed most of the housework, so we had breakfast, a very late breakfast I might add, and then the children washed and dried the breakfast dishes.

When they had finished the breakfast dishes, my daughter went off with her dad to collect firewood from one of the local farms, as a HUGE tree has come down in the paddock that they will be sowing very shortly. My son stayed home with me so that he could finish the vacuuming and mop the verandahs. He was still completing the dishes when I noticed fur bunnies along the skirting boards and the carpet near the skirting boards – aargh – this is why my asthma has been so severe, lately,  so I took hold of the vacuum cleaner, thinking that I could actually help with the housework. Silly me!

No such luck – I had nearly finished along the edges of the skirting boards in the loungeroom, and was vacumming one of the corners that didn’t look as if it had been vacuumed for a very long while, when it started. I coughed and coughed, my breathing became more difficult and then the wheezing started. My son was up in his bedroom, and I thought that he was never going to come down, but eventually he did, and I gasped, “Nebuliser,” at him. Of course, where was it? In the car. Where was the car? Not here! Darn it! Usually we are all together as a family, but the wood needed to be cut and the housework finished, and we couldn’t be in two places at once.

He wanted to call an ambulance, but living out here, the calls all go to Adelaide for ambulance, and by the time he had explained where we were, it would have been too late. He jumped on his bicycle and rode the  three kilometres to where my husband and daughter were cutting wood, and found them just arriving there after going to see about buying some oats. He threw the bike into the trailer, and they drove home and set up the nebuliser. I was so hot and unable to breathe, but somehow God sustained me through it all.

There were two lessons learned from this -

• Lesson one is that the nebuliser needs to be with me at all times, which was the reason that we left it in the car in the first place.
• Lesson two is that I need to explain to our children exactly how things need to be done.

Yes, it’s easier to do things ourselves – well, sometimes! It takes time and effort to show our children how we want things done, but how will they learn unless we teach them?

The things of God are learned in the same way -
It is written in the prophets, And they shall be all taught of God. Every man therefore that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father, cometh unto me. John 6:45

My son is learning well, and this afternoon he has used the crevice tool to clean along the edges, and even went as  far as to shift the piano, which hasn’t been shifted for a very long time. Now all that we need to be able to do is to shift it back…  It weighs a ton! My husband and son managed to shift it back, and my son commented, “Now I have gorilla arms – they have stretched that far!” Now, I wonder, how often should we shift the piano???

I praise God that He strengthens us through times of trials, and He gives us His Peace – the verse that I remembered today was:~

Thou wilt keep him in perfect peace,

whose mind is stayed on thee:

because he trusteth in thee. Isaiah 26:3

and He did ~ He kept me in perfect peace!

Dear God…

This powerpoint presentation is another one that we had sent to us from Pastor Quentin, and I thought it was ever so cute – kids really do say the darnedest things! I hope that you get a laugh from some of them.

Between Two Tigers

Between Two Tigers, which we purchased from Voice of the Martyrs, would have to be one of the most compelling and thought-provoking books that I have had the pleasure of reading recently. In Vietnam, they have a saying and that is, “If you use a blanket to cover yourself, then you will not know whether or not there are lice inside that blanket.”

People who live outside Vietnam think that there is freedom of religion within Vietnam, but if you really want to find out whether that is true, you need to walk in the shoes of the members of the persecuted church.

Christians in Vietnam live between two “tigers” – Communism and Buddhism/tribal religions, and no matter which way they turn, there is a “tiger” threatening them. Do they stop worshipping Jesus? No! They travel the lonely roads, face police interrogation and prison, and they do it all with a sense of joy and accomplishment, knowing that Christ’s power rests upon them.

Vietnam is a small country in Indochina, which has suffered greatly and been wounded by various wars. The people have felt that their lives were being sacrificed to Communism, and at about the same time, Buddhism was brought in from China, with pagodas, shrines and temples adorning every home. Superstitious religious rites were practiced with regularity.

Communism began around 1954 and the churches persecution still continues today, although the North is more heavily persecuted than the South. The Christians who remained in the North after Vietnam was split had their Bibles confiscated and they had their crosses destroyed. Atheism and Darwinism was taught, while newspapers spread false information about believers. In the North, churches are even told what they can preach, and the pastors are controlled by the government.

House churches are one way that the North Vietnamese Christians can spread the Word of God, but there are harsh penalties – imprisonment and severe beatings for anyone caught with a Bible and preaching the Word of God. Most of these house churches contain ten to twelve people who have continued meeting like this for months, and in some cases, years. Today Vietnam is a place where Jesus Christ is changing the course of history. The gospel is being preached all over the land, and the land is ripe for the harvest.

There are many stories of extreme persecution within this book, and real Christians endure such hardships that it makes me shudder, knowing that these people are willing to give their all for their love of the Lord Jesus Christ and the spreading of the Gospel. Bibles are still in short supply in Vietnam, and the Vietnam Christians guard their Bibles with their lives, sometimes burying Bibles so that they will not be confiscated. People borrow Bibles so that they can learn of the love of God and instill His Word into their ♥♥♥.

Some Christians pedal 40 kilometres to preach their sermons (Gulp!), and they spend whatever money that they have to photocopy tracts and encourage people to read them. Once they have read the tract, they return it and receive a new one. We can only imagine the hardships that they endure, to bring others to the saving grace of the love of our Lord Jesus Christ. Praise God that there are Christians in Vietnam prepared to give their all so that others can learn of the love of God! This is an excellent book, and one that I can heartily recommend.