Psalm 104:5-9 English Standard Version
5 He set the earth on its foundations, so that it should never be moved. 6 You covered it with the deep as with a garment; the waters stood above the mountains. 7 At your rebuke they fled; at the sound of your thunder they took to flight. 8 The mountains rose, the valleys sank down to the place that you appointed for them. 9 You set a boundary that they may not pass,so that they might not again cover the earth.
This passage is truly remarkable–overflowing with the wonder, power, majesty and outright love of God the Father, our Holy Spirit Comforter and Jesus the Word. How final are verses 5, 8 and 9! Never needing to be mentioned again–a perfect example of “God says it, that’s it”! Forever finalised!
How temporary are verses 6 and 7! I wondered if the waters ever thought that their rapid elevation to all consuming and all conquering was a permanent thing? Yet–a rebuke – it wasn’t even a project, a task, a month’s work, didn’t even rate a mention other than “rebuke”...-a simple rebuke and it’s well and truly all over for you mr. waters!
Sometimes I think we so easily forget (or fail to understand) just who God actually is and who Jesus is. We know the Word created all things with the power of the Holy Spirit (Colossians 1:16, Job 33:4) but often we reduce Jesus to “our buddy”. However the staggering thing is He wants to be a buddy, our friend, our confidante, our Lord provider, our healer–the list goes on and on... . It’s no wonder us humans are confused!
Does it all come back to simple acceptance that He is God and you and I are not. How long will you live for? 70, 80 even a 100 years – we simply have a few decades to set up our life for ALL of eternity, scary!!
The richest guy that ever lived, who literally owned nations(1 Kings 4:20-7:12), re-shaped and honed military, created navies, perfected international trade, rewrote foreign policy, reshaped domestic and international fiscal policy and achieved more than any other person aside from God incarnate–Solomon summarised it this way:
Ecclesiastes 12:13
13 The end of the matter; all has been heard. Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. 14 For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.
A Very Well-Earned Break!
Our dear church family –apologies for so long between Tas updates. Wow, what a hard last 3 months it’s been. Both Lynda and I have been absolutely smashed at our individual jobs. The daily hours have been very long – often in excess of 14 for Lynda and 10-12 + for me. On top of that is the Living Success work and also trying to get to the block to do fencing between the weeks of rain. It’s just been a very physically and mentally challenging time these last three months! Both Lynda and I are pretty much exhausted.
However, the first week of school holidays has rolled around in October and we scampered of to Coles bay for three nights of rest, bush-walking and some time with the Lord.
The photo above/topis from Coles Bay looking towards Mt Parsons, Mt Baudin, Mt Dove and Mt Amos. Remarkable countryside indeed –some of Tassies finest:
We then headed up the mountain to the top of the Wineglass Bay lookout and unfortunately the weather closed in and it was prudent to head back down the mountain to the safety of the car park! But at the top it was truly remarkable...a staggering piece of Tassie beauty and a real testament to the glory of the Lord.
Looking at the rock terrain – just mind-blowing formations and truly spectacular up close–this ‘whale head’ one, was the size of a very large car and spectacular colours of pinks, greys and reds.
Thinking of a granite bench top at say $1000, there must be hundreds of billions of dollars (even more!) of of just bench tops alone in these low-lying mountain ranges.
The incredible diversity of wealth and provision of the Lord is truly remarkable. This above was just a couple of acres out of a 10km stretch or more of mountains x some 500m plus high! There’s a few bench tops just in this lot here, let alone another 4 mountains worth. Remember these area few boulders above the tree canopy - its solid rocks below the trees also!
Helped a Mate with His Shed
A good friend of mine bought a 6m x 6m colourbond shed and it was great to give him a hand for a couple of days and start to erect it.Really looking forward to having a crack at our own soon. Actually, spent some in time the last couple of days, whilst we’ve been away, planning out our own and piecing together the aspects of a development.
This was a really good glimpse at the Meccano set approach. These are certainly involved when you haven’t done them before but when you actually get into it, they start to unfold quite sensibly.
Our First “Sawmill” – Kind of... 😀
Through a contact I met via work I came across a bandsaw mill that has been build for cutting slabs, boards, planks etc. Nothing too dramatic but a serviceable old beastie.
I talked Mark Wilson into, very kindly, going to look at it with me and it all checks out pretty well. Now we just have to organise to get it back to my shed (at home) until I can get our shed built up on the 14 acres.However,this acquisition ($500 it cost me personally) has really spurred me on to get cracking and start planning throughput for a truckload or two of Tassie Oak floorboards–which just quietly are worth an absolute FORTUNE!
All the bits of this mill work pretty well and I have 3 x brand new bandsaw blades. Cutting throat (width) is about 700mm so we can accommodate reasonable slabs as well and really simply things like100mm wide flooring for example. The rolling bed is 6m, so 6m long logs x max of 700mm wide. The bed can easily be lengthened as well for some of our much longer trees should we want to go there.
I’m actually pretty excited about this and cant wait to get it up and functioning.
Getting Closer - 1000 Radio Programs – A Special Time of Thanksgiving to the Lord
We have produced 971 programs to date. That is 971 weeks of Radio. 18.67 years. Thank you to everyone that has stuck by us as we traveled down this particular path of obedience and honour to the Lord. I think time has shown that it probably was a God idea not a “good idea”. After18+years we are still here,and He is still funding us.
Hence our strong intention to hold our special thanksgiving service mid next year at some point.We are working through this still at the moment but please be aware that we will be having some kind of celebration to honour the Lord in this milestone that, God-willing, we reach next June.
We will keep you posted as to when details are confirmed and available.
As I mentioned previously–It has been an exceptionally difficult and draining last few months. Please forgive me for the late Tassie Update. After 3 days away last week both Lynda and I do feel a lot better and are bracing ourselves for the hectic run through to Christmas. All will be well, praise the Lord.
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