Beginnings
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
I think beginnings are fragile. Full of possibility, yes, full of promise, yes, but also very fragile. My guess is that Satan hates beginnings and tries to confound and cloud the vision of a new start.
I had a dream the other night that a huge, spitting serpent with legs was standing on my neck, pinning me face down. The serpent was dragon-like, the same one I've imagined when reading the book of Revelations:
"A great and wondrous sign apppeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his heads. His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that he might devour her child the moment he was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. The woman fled into the desert to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days. And there was war in heaven." (Revelations 12)
Such a dramatic excerpt to be thinking about these days. . . . but I think there is real battle going on in our lives (all of our lives). And a lot of it has to do with new life, new beginnings, spiritual birth.
I write this not to focus on Satan, or to give him a foothold, but to renew trust in God's ability to prepare a place for me and my family--a place of respite from the accuser.
"The great dragon was hurled down -- that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say:
"Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night has been hurled down. They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. Therefore REJOICE! . . (Revelations 12). "
Lord, thank you that this new beginning for my family is protected and set apart, covered in the blood of the Lamb. Amen.
I had a dream the other night that a huge, spitting serpent with legs was standing on my neck, pinning me face down. The serpent was dragon-like, the same one I've imagined when reading the book of Revelations:
"A great and wondrous sign apppeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on his heads. His tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that he might devour her child the moment he was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. The woman fled into the desert to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days. And there was war in heaven." (Revelations 12)
Such a dramatic excerpt to be thinking about these days. . . . but I think there is real battle going on in our lives (all of our lives). And a lot of it has to do with new life, new beginnings, spiritual birth.
I write this not to focus on Satan, or to give him a foothold, but to renew trust in God's ability to prepare a place for me and my family--a place of respite from the accuser.
"The great dragon was hurled down -- that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say:
"Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night has been hurled down. They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death. Therefore REJOICE! . . (Revelations 12). "
Lord, thank you that this new beginning for my family is protected and set apart, covered in the blood of the Lamb. Amen.
