“Emotions” – Now Think On This by Steve Martin

June 15, 2020 Love For His People in Charlotte, North Carolina USA

“Go, take yourself a wife of harlotry and children of harlotry, for the land has committed great harlotry by departing from the Lord.” Hosea 1:2, NKJV

Have you ever read the Biblical book Hosea, considered a “small” prophet before? You know, the one short book in the Old Testament that is between the major prophets Daniel and Joel.

A quick storyline of his from Hosea the Prophet reads, “Hosea (active 750-722 B.C.) was a prophet of the kingdom of Israel. He called on Israel to repent its sins of apostasy and warned of the judgment to come from God. His writings form the first of the Old Testament books of the Minor Prophets.

Hosea was the son of Beeri and apparently belonged to the upper classes. Judging from his elegant style, he was highly cultured. Hosea married Gomer, daughter of Diblaim, who bore him two sons, the older of whom he called Yezreel, meaning “God sows.” This name may have been intended to signify the replanting of Israel back on its own soil after it had been dispersed in exile. The second son was called Lo Ami, meaning “not my people, ” to indicate God’s rejection of Israel as His people because of its faithlessness. Hosea’s daughter by Gomer was metaphorically named Lo-ruhamah, meaning “the unpitied one.” Since Gomer after her marriage became an unfaithful “wife of harlotry, ” it is possible that Lo-ruhamah and perhaps her brothers were illegitimate children. Scholars have speculated whether the prophet’s tragic marital experience was real or merely an allegory to stress the infidelity of Israel.”

In these modern days of our enlightenment and superiority of knowledge, Hosea doesn’t get a lot of acclamation or even comment in church or congregational circles. After all, he “only” spoke to the kings and the people of ancient Israel around 700 B.C., and what does that have to do with us today?

A lot.

Though I don’t consider or proclaim myself to be a biblical scholar, I have made it a consistent habit and disciple to read the Bible almost every day, believing that what it says, as the Creator of the Universe Himself told us, “Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” John 8:31-23, NKJV

And where does wisdom come, that we need so much today? Lord knows we do.

“For Adonai (the Lord) gives wisdom; from his mouth comes knowledge and understanding.

He stores up common sense for the upright, is a shield to those whose conduct is blameless,

in order to guard the courses of justice and preserve the way of those faithful to him. Then you will understand righteousness, justice, fairness and every good path. For wisdom will enter your heart, knowledge will be enjoyable for you, discretion will watch over you, and discernment will guard you.” Proverbs 2:6-11, Complete Jewish Bible

As I began to read the first chapters of Hosea, I could sense the emotions of God the Father, trying to get His people’s attention through the practical picture he gave Hosea to publicly demonstrate.

Take a wife, a harlot. Yes, take one who has given herself to any and all. Have children. Call them the names which shows what I have called My people at this time in their ways apart from Me. Demonstrate how I feel, Hosea, about the condition of My people, My country, My heart.

Continuing to read, I could sense the passion of the Lord for His people, His emotional anger expressed as they had departed from His ways, which would be the only way to have life, if only they would seek and follow after Him. You can feel His heart cry for their return to Him.

America and the nations of the world are in this same condition today. We have turned from God. We have sought our own ways. We have lifted up our knowledge, our understanding, our attempts to remove God from any and all parts of our lives so as to not be accountable to Him Who sits on the throne.

If we do not cry out in our hearts, our souls, our minds and emotions for the Living God of Israel, the One Who alone can save, we are among those who are to be most pitied.

And yet if we repent, He will heal our land, which is a verse most used these days but which we must know and do.

“God appeared to Solomon that very night and said, “I accept your prayer; yes, I have chosen this place as a temple for sacrifice, a house of worship. If I ever shut off the supply of rain from the skies or order the locusts to eat the crops or send a plague on my people, and my people, my God-defined people, respond by humbling themselves, praying, seeking my presence, and turning their backs on their wicked lives, I’ll be there ready for you: I’ll listen from heaven, forgive their sins, and restore their land to health.” 2 Chronicles 7:12-15, THE MESSAGE

Only God, the One Who created us, Who alone has the answers, can save America and all nations who would turn to Him. As my good friend Mordechai continually tells me, we must repent. We must turn from our wicked ways, which we as a nation have followed, obvious to any who have eyes to see. We must acknowledge and know that Jesus Christ, Yeshua HaMashiach, must be lifted up in our individual lives, our homes, our places of worship, our cities, our country.

Lord help us to do just that.

Now think on this.

Ahava and shalom,

Steve Martin, Founder/President  Love For His People, Inc.

UPCOMING ALIYAH FOR HIS PEOPLE EVENT IN THE CHARLOTTE, NC/ROCK HILL, SC REGION – Register now.

https://loveforhispeople.com/2020/01/26/aliyah-for-his-people-a-new-ministry-of-love-for-his-people-in-charlotte-north-carolina/
Carolyn Hyde will also lead Messianic worship!

SPECIAL NOTE: Our ministry’s new mobile app is available for iPhones and Androids is available. See it below? These are free app downloads! Look here: Love For His People free phone app

Please sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter: Now Think On This. The sign-up form is on our new ministry website: https://loveforhispeople.com

You are welcome to help support the work of this ministry, including the assistance we give to families in Israel: DONATE online now. You can also send checks to: Love For His People P.O. Box 414 Pineville, NC 28134

E-mail: loveforhispeople@gmail.com

Please share Now Think On This with your friends on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, and LinkedIn.  Others will be thankful you did. And I thank you too.

Now Think On This #518 – in the year of our Lord 06.15.2020 – “Emotions” Monday 7:45 am in Charlotte, NC USA

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“Holy Spirit. Ruach HaKodesh.” – Now Think On This by Steve Martin

All Nations Church, Watch of the Lord, 1995. Blow the shofars!
Mahesh Chavda on the left. Ed Brigham holding the mic in the middle.

May 22, 2020 Love For His People ministry in Charlotte, NC USA

“…when they had come together, they asked Him, saying, “Lord, will You at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” And He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has put in His own authority.  But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” Acts 1:6-8, NKJV

When the small group of about five of us from Columbus High School (Catholic) met for a time of study, led by my friend Terri Smith, they ended the meeting by praying for me. It was 1973, my senior year in Waterloo, Iowa, and they had told me prior that they would seek the Lord on my behalf, to receive something more, way beyond what I could have already learned in 12 years of religious education. Having grown up in the Midwest state of Iowa*, in one of the finest school systems in the USA, I knew I needed and thus desired more in my life.

Columbus Catholic High School in Waterloo, Iowa

And I was not disappointed. After they circled around me, laid hands on my head and shoulders, I began to know the Holy Spirit in a very real, very tangible way. I was 18. He had been around for all eternity.

This One was no longer in my mind, my heart, my soul as just the “Third Person of the Trinity”. Nor was He just “Holy Ghost” – like Casper the friendly ghost who I grew up watching on TV. He was no longer some foreign concept that somehow, I was supposed to have believed in without ever seeing. Of course, I was taught to believe that in the Apostles Creed from my youth up.

No, Holy Spirit, without the “The”, became my Guide, my Comforter, the One Who gave me the ability to pray in a language which I didn’t know, for things I wasn’t sure I was praying for, Who had just come into my life. He had also endowed me with gifts of the Holy Spirit, which are listed in Scripture, found in Romans and Corinthians, written by Paul the apostle, the believing Jew in the Messiah, the One Who had fulfilled His promise in sending Holy Spirit.

Instrumental as part of the foundational stone in my Christian life, was the first gift of speaking in tongues. From that point on I knew, really knew in my heart that I was praying the right prayers. It was not just for the Pentecostals down the street, which previously I had considered somewhat weird. Nor the Protestant and Catholic Charismatic people, which were being blessed all around the world with that current move of the Holy Spirit in the 1960s and 70s.

Holy Spirit symbol in the Catholic Charismatic Renewal

The Baptism of the Holy Spirit had come to me. That moment in time forever changed my life. Forever changed my life.

Yeshua (Jesus) had fulfilled His promise to His followers, the Jews in 33 AD, that after His death, burial, and resurrection He would send His Holy Spirit to them, for the power they would need to obey His commission to take the Good News, the Gospel, to the nations. They too were not disappointed.

As historically and factually recorded in Acts 2:1-13 (I am quoting here from the Complete Jewish Bible), we know what happened to these first disciples, all Jewish believers in Yeshua.

“The festival of Shavu‘ot (Pentecost as known in English) arrived, and the believers all gathered together in one place. Suddenly there came a sound from the sky like the roar of a violent wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting. Then they saw what looked like tongues of fire, which separated and came to rest on each one of them. They were all filled with the Ruach HaKodesh and began to talk in different languages, as the Spirit enabled them to speak.

Now there were staying in Yerushalayim (Jerusalem) religious Jews from every nation under heaven. When they heard this sound, a crowd gathered; they were confused, because each one heard the believers speaking in his own language. Totally amazed, they asked, “How is this possible? Aren’t all these people who are speaking from the Galil (Galilee)? How is it that we hear them speaking in our native languages? We are Parthians, Medes, Elamites; residents of Mesopotamia, Y’hudah (Judah), Cappadocia, Pontus, Asia, Phrygia, Pamphylia, Egypt, the parts of Libya near Cyrene; visitors from Rome; Jews by birth and proselytes; Jews from Crete and from Arabia. . . ! How is it that we hear them speaking in our own languages about the great things God has done?” Amazed and confused, they all went on asking each other, “What can this mean?” But others made fun of them and said, “They’ve just had too much wine!”

I am not much of a wine drinker (just have not gotten a liking to the taste) but obviously these Jewish believers had quite a reaction when the power of the Holy Spirit came upon them that day. The lives they then lived from that point on proved to the world that indeed they were empowered by Someone outside of just a fleshly commitment to obey the Lord. Holy Spirit had given them the courage, the boldness, the empowerment they would need to take that which Yeshua (Jesus) had taught them, to a dying world which too needed what they had been given.

Lord knows we each need the Holy Spirt today in our lives.

I have been to the Upper Room in the Old City of Jerusalem several times. Though we cannot always know the “exact” location where anything ever happened in mankind’s history, this surely is close enough for me. And when I have gathered with many, many Christians, and Jews, believers in the One God, in that place, I can tangibly feel the presence of the Holy Spirit.

Greg Partipilo – one of the four men on our Love For His People 1st annual fall men’s trip – Ahava Adventures. In the Upper Room, Jerusalem. Oct. 2019 Photo by Steve Martin

From that initial day in 1973 with my high school friends, the 3rd person of the Trinity, God Himself, has led me in the ways of the Lord. He has spoken words of guidance, hope, direction, and encouragement into my spirit. He has taught me the ways of God the Father, and the impacting knowledge of the Only Begotten Son, Yeshua HaMashiach, Jesus Christ.

During the late 1990s, here in Charlotte, North Carolina, dozens of us would gather each Friday night at All Nations Church, in an actual converted horse barn which, along with my Dad, Louis Martin, had first taken out the horse stalls to begin transformation of the place!

The gathering was called the “Watch of the Lord” by Mahesh and Bonnie Chavda, to have 8 hours of praise and worship of the Lord, prayer for Israel, the USA, and the nations, prophetic words, and healing for the sick. Each Friday night from 10 pm to 6 am. To this day it continues, though with a few less hours. (You can read, and see photos, of those years in my book, “The Promise. One Man’s Journey To See God’s Word Revealed, 2013).

One amazing facet of the evening/early morning hours were the lengthy times of praying in tongues together. In fact, on one special night, we had a minister present who spoke of how the Lord had instructed him to pray for hours in tongues, unknowing what he was praying for. Years later, at a critical time in his ministry, the Holy Spirit told him that those previous hours of praying in tongues had prepared him and those around him for the great plan God had brought him to, in which he needed the faith and courage to build a Christian radio station in the Northeast corner of the USA. The ground had been prepared through his obedience, and the Holy Spirit’s empowerment, to then build.

To this day I regularly pray in tongues.

We not only look to the annual special season of Pentecost, celebrated for centuries by the Church, but all the way back to the very first time of Holy Spirit’s coming during the Lord’s Feast of Shavuot, occurring in the Jewish city of Jerusalem, Yerushalayim.

The Holy Spirit came then, to empower and send out the believers. His ongoing desire is to do the same for us, for those who continue to seek the Living God of Israel and His plans and purposes to be fulfilled in their lives.

Come Holy Spirit. (Or as in Hebrew, Bo Ruach HaKodesh). Fill our hearts and souls with Your presence, O Lord.

Now think on this.

Ahava and shalom,

Steve Martin, Founder/President  Love For His People, Inc.

*The Iowa educational school system, in the 1970s, had the final testing for students that was used in the nation at that time, based on its high standards of teaching high school students. It was called the Iowa Basic Skills. And the Catholic school system was known for having an even higher standard than what the state, and nation, had set.

Come on!

UPCOMING ALIYAH FOR HIS PEOPLE EVENT IN THE CHARLOTTE, NC/ROCK HILL, SC REGION – Register now.

https://loveforhispeople.com/2020/01/26/aliyah-for-his-people-a-new-ministry-of-love-for-his-people-in-charlotte-north-carolina/
Carolyn Hyde will also lead Messianic worship!

SPECIAL NOTE: Our ministry’s new mobile app is available for iPhones and Androids is available. See it below? These are free app downloads! Look here: Love For His People free phone app

Please sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter: Now Think On This. The sign-up form is on our new ministry website: https://loveforhispeople.com

You are welcome to help support the work of this ministry, including the assistance we give to families in Israel: DONATE online now. You can also send checks to: Love For His People P.O. Box 414 Pineville, NC 28134

E-mail: loveforhispeople@gmail.com

Please share Now Think On This with your friends on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, and LinkedIn.  Others will be thankful you did. And I thank you too.

Now Think On This #511 – in the year of our Lord 05.22.2020 – “Holy Spirit” – Friday, 5:25 am in Charlotte, NC USA

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“I Never Promised You A Rose Garden” – Now Think On This by Steve Martin

April 26, 2020 Love For His People ministry in Charlotte, NC USA

“And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.  “He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for My sake will find it.” Matthew 1);38-39, NASU

Remember these lyrics back in the day? “I beg your pardon, I never promised you a rose garden. Along with the sunshine there’s gotta be a little rain some time.”

So sang Lynn Anderson in 1970 on the country-western radio stations as they were known way back then. The songwriter must have used a very loose interpretation of Jesus’ (Yeshua’s) own words to His disciples, “If you don’t go all the way with me, through thick and thin, you don’t deserve me. If your first concern is to look after yourself, you’ll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you’ll find both yourself and me.” Matthew 10:38-39, THE MESSAGE

The modern, syrupy gospel some would dish out to the gathered on Sundays and on social media platforms would make it seem that the sole purpose of Jesus saving us would be to give us happiness, to make this life rosy before we die and go to the next one.

We constantly hear with misguided words that if we are not happy then something is terribly wrong. If life is not going the way we were told it would be when we came to Christ, then all of our self-love actions can’t be worth the effort to be a Christian.

If the songs we sing, even the “Christian praise and worship songs” that populate the radio, YouTube, and love stations aren’t focused on “me, me, me” then something must be totally out of order.

It is to be all about “me”, right? Jesus came to make “me” happy, yes?

A generation which is brought up hearing that the love of God is all about me and my happiness, then we, as the ones who were/are to be teaching them, have really, really missed the mark in showing them the right way.

Yeshua did not call the 12 main followers, and the seeking crowds, to get on the road of “It’s All About Me Way”.

What did He really say when He called the disciples?

Take up His cross and follow Him.

“And He was saying to them all, ” If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross daily and follow Me.  “For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake, he is the one who will save it.  “For what is a man profited if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits himself?” Luke 9:23-26, NASU

Living a self-love life is far from the one Yeshua called us to live. Going after that which we are told is necessary to make us happy is not the Gospel that Jesus preached. It is not the life we are to be living as disciples of the Life-Giver.

Followers of Yeshua lay down their lives for others as He did. Those who have been called to be His disciples are not to be seeking what we think is “best for us, what makes us happy.” We are to be seeking and doing what makes HIM pleased with our lives.

That is a life of self-giving, sacrificing, living for others, caring for the ones who have not, preaching the real Gospel, the one that Jesus and the early apostles took to the nations, as they laid their lives down. And yes, even got martyred in the end for doing just that.

One concern I have for the generations living now is that many have bought into the false gospel that it is all about us. Jesus never taught that. His true disciples never heard that. The true followers of Jesus who have lived and died through the centuries that have followed never prescribed to anything of a self-love gospel, but to the one that they too were saved to give themselves to the plans and purposes of the Father, in His love to save others.

Never were we promised a rose garden. We were promised the opportunity to follow Jesus, to take up His cross and follow Him.

“As He was setting out on a journey, a man ran up to Him and knelt before Him, and asked Him, “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” And Jesus said to him, “Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone.  “You know the commandments, ‘DO NOT MURDER, DO NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, DO NOT STEAL, DO NOT BEAR FALSE WITNESS, Do not defraud, HONOR YOUR FATHER AND MOTHER.'” 

And he said to Him, “Teacher, I have kept all these things from my youth up.” Looking at him, Jesus felt a love for him and said to him, “One thing you lack: go and sell all you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow Me.”  But at these words he was saddened, and he went away grieving, for he was one who owned much property.” Mark 10:17-22, NASU

Paul preached the correct Gospel. So must we be doing the same.

“…strengthening the souls of the disciples, exhorting them to continue in the faith, and saying, “We must through many tribulations enter the kingdom of God.” Acts 14:22-23, NKJV

Trials and tribulations are what we are promised. Accepting that, let us thus get on with doing what He wants us to do. By His grace others will come to know the saving knowledge of accepting His salvation and live.

As the shaking continues in the nations, which is the Lord’s doing as He had prophesied through His prophets prior to these end times, our purpose in living is to have His purpose in living. When you know that, and do it, then whatever He brings your way will be the best.

We have been called to live, and die, for others, even as Jesus Himself laid down His life for us.

Let’s get on doing it.

Now think on this.

Ahava and shalom,

Steve Martin, Founder/President  Love For His People, Inc.

SPECIAL NOTE: Our ministry’s new mobile app is available for iPhones and Androids is available. These are free app downloads! Look here: Love For His People free phone app

Please sign up for my bi-weekly newsletter: Now Think On This. The sign-up form is on our new ministry website: https://loveforhispeople.com

You are welcome to help support the work of this ministry, including the assistance we give to families in Israel: DONATE online now. You can also send checks to: Love For His People P.O. Box 414 Pineville, NC 28134

E-mail: loveforhispeople@gmail.com

Please share Now Think On This with your friends on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, and LinkedIn.  Others will be thankful you did. And I thank you too.

Now Think On This #504 – in the year of our Lord 04.26.2020 – “I Never Promised You A Rose Garden” – Sunday, 5:55 am in Charlotte, NC USA