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BREAK UP YOUR FALLOW GROUND

In the fourth chapter of Jeremiah, God says, "Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns."  The idea of plowing the ground before planting it is very natural; but when we consider the process, it can seem like a very violent act to the earth that we are preparing.   We tear open the surface with the plowshare or pulverize the ground with a rotary tiller, churning and softening the dirt to create a rich seedbed in which the new plants will thrive and produce crops.   Fallow ground is that which has not been planted for a time but has been left to grow over with weeds.   Being unplanted, it is therefore unfruitful and unproductive.   It becomes a tangle of useless vines and thorns.   We, as individuals, often have areas of our lives that we have left "fallow."   These are areas that are unfruitful and unproductive for the Lord.   We all know that the fruit of the Spirit listed in Galatians 5 is, "love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentl...
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THE WORDS OF ETERNAL LIFE

Jesus’ teaching was very hard for the people to accept.   Just the day before, He had multiplied a few loaves and fish to feed over five thousand people.   They had come out to see Him then because of the miracles that He was performing on the sick and afflicted.   They loved Him then, but their focus seemed to be more on those miracles than on trying to understand the words of life that Jesus was speaking to them.   They were ready to accept Him as a prophet, and they would have even tried to make Him a king; but they couldn’t see that Jesus was much more than that: He was the Son of God and their long-awaited Messiah.   Jesus had sent His twelve disciples over the sea to Capernaum the night before.   It was then that He had appeared to them walking on the sea as they struggled against a great storm.   When the people realized that Jesus had gone, they found means to cross the sea also and found Jesus at Capernaum.   Jesus called them out by ...
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THE WALL

After 40 years of wandering in the wilderness, and after Moses’ death, God chose Joshua to bring the Israelites into the Land that He had promised them.   The first great obstacle that the Hebrews encountered after their miraculous crossing of the Jordan River was the city of Jericho.     Jericho was a formidable city with a stone wall that presented a difficult challenge to Joshua and his army.   The city was crucial to the conquest of Canaan in that it defended the central hill country and the other cities of the region.   Joshua had sent spies into the city to survey its defenses and had learned among other things that the people were terrified of the Israelites and their God because of all they had heard that the Lord had done for them.   God spoke to Joshua and told him, "See, I have given into thine hand Jericho, and the king thereof, and the mighty men of valour." (Joshua 6:2).   Moreover, the Lord appeared to Joshua in the plain of Jer...
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