Now What???

It sure was great to make it to church on Easter...The Praise and worship....great...The Stick Team and Drama...Wow......Jason Drawing with the message...Cool...The message to be out of bondage.....God is like orchestrating His desires in our church!!!! I am so blessed to be in such a wonderful place where God honors us and our desires to honor Him.

Since I have been unable to attend due to health you don't sometimes realize what you could be missing...I know when people asked me how I was doing..they genuinely cared. Prayers for me are being lifted up in my behalf and I believe they are being heard. I woke up today and was able to get right up without excrutiating pain. I know I am about to receive a Miracle in healing...either by His grace or by the hands of a doctor...and if His will is to keep on the way I am, I will still look to Him for every thing. Every day I just want to know Him more..!

Reflecting on Today's Time with Him..
I was reading in John 14 and really had the chance to break down just what the Holy week has meant to me..After Blogginmg here and getting some of the science of what happened to the body and how death on the cross was so cruel..I now understand the person Jesus was. Not only the love He has for me, but the true character of being my friend dying for me.
The verses from John 14 :23 Jesus replied, “If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him. 24He who does not love me will not obey my teaching. These words you hear are not my own; they belong to the Father who sent me.
Now this is a powerful statement and look at what He tells me and you. The way He says WE just overwhelms me. I am not by myself here....That's a pretty big we when Jesus tells me this and then He also tells me that these are not His own words but the words of.......God..And notice this is not past tense, this is the here and now He's talking about. I love His presence and Love that He is including me when He says We .
So after the cross it is WE that make our home with Him....Good Stuff!!!! I love it when He talks to me..It's even better when I listen..
HE'S ALIVE!!!

The Cross

Wow this is the day that He did it..actually accepted our sins through death on a Cross...I did quite a bit of searching and it seems like the Pic of the the crosses would very closely represent what they may have been. I am so blessed to know it's true. Here's a little thought from others...



Jesus' Death: Six Hours of Eternity on the Cross
Lambert Dolphin

A superficial reading of the gospel narratives concerning the death of Jesus will show that He was nailed to the cross at 9 o'clock in the morning, and was dead by 3 in the afternoon. His terrible ordeal, it would seem, was over in a mere six hours.

The agony in the Garden of Gethsemene the night before had been an ordeal in prayer before His Father that we can scarcely understand. The writer of Hebrews comments on this incident,
"In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard for his godly fear. Although he was a Son, he learned obedience through what he suffered..." (Hebrews 5:7, 8)

Then, too, Jesus had been up the rest of the night without sleep enduring scourging, beating, cruel mockery and unspeakable brutality. He was already weakened when he carried his cross, stumbling, to the place of crucifixion alongside the main public highway, probably just outside the Damascus Gate. Several medical doctors and forensic experts have written books about the common Roman form of execution---death by crucifixion. Often the process took several days. The nailing of hands and feet forced the victim to push up against the weight of his own body to take a single breath. In the hot sun, terrible thirst ensued and death came in most cases from suffocation amidst great pain. The victim was also naked and humiliated---death on the cross was reserved for the most wretched of all criminals.

Wood was in short supply in Israel in Roman times. It is likely that small trees (such as these olive trees) were pressed into service to handle the thousands of excecutions. Crosses were stuck into the ground along major thoroughfares to offer maximum public viewing which included public ridicule and scorn. The terrible nature of this punishment helped enforce Rome's control over the Jews whom they hated anyway. In the Law of Moses hanging a criminal on a tree or cross was reserved for the most serious crimes, "And if a man has committed a sin worthy of death, and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his corpse shall not hang all night on the tree, but you shall surely bury him on the same day (for he who is hanged is accursed of God), so that you do not defile your land which the Lord your God gives you as an inheritance." (Deuteronomy 21:22-23)There is much more to the death of Jesus on the cross than the visible suffering, terrible pain and suffering, and the incredible ignominy of such a horrible death for One who was not only innocent but also the very Son of God.

So I hope "The Spot " has impact on others to help them believe what actually has taken place..It took this action to bring us back into His presence.
Thank you Jesus!
Thanks for all the concerns with my up coming surgery...I will find out next week if it's fusion of the three discs....I really am not forward to such a long recovery.

GOOD FRIDAY 

NAIL THROUGH HAND 

The Crucifixion--How Jesus Died

I wanted to post pic of the cross and in my search this informaton appeared..Any way you look at it, it ain't pretty...The agony of crucifixion is brutal in any form..check this out. Imagine that Jesus did this freely to save us. We humans can be very gruesome and we were forgiven through this act.

CRUCIFIXION

"Two Questions About Crucifixion" reads the title of a fascinating article in the April 1989 issue of Bible Review. Below it were two subheadings, "Does the Victim Die of Asphyxiation," and "Would Nails in the Hand Hold the Weight of the Body?"
In it the author discredits the previous theory of crucifixion as formulated by A. A. LeBec in 1925 and given widespread publicity by Dr. Pierre Barbet from 1953 on, that (1) Jesus died of asphyxiation due to being unable to raise himself up to breathe, and (2) the nails through his hands were actually through his wrists (assuming the palms of the hands could not hold the body weight). It now appears that the evidence does not support Barbet's theory.
Medical research for this project was done by Frederick T. Zugibe, who is adjunct associate professor of pathology at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, as well as author of The Cross and the Shroud--A Medical Examiner Investigates the Crucifixion. Zugibe demonstrates quite conclusively that:
(1) Jesus did not die of asphyxiation, but rather from shock and trauma. Additionally, an impaled man with arms stretched straight over his head would suffocate in minutes, whereas a man with hands outstretched to the side at an angle of 60 70 degrees (as on a cross) could live for hours without suffocating.
(2) There are two locations in the PALM of each HAND that will allow a nail to penetrate and carry the full body weight up to several hundred pounds, making the "wrist theory" unnecessary to explain how Christ's arms were attached to the cross.

Years ago, LeBec and Barbet had concluded that a person hung by his arms overhead would suffocate in a manner of minutes, due to the inability of the lungs to expand and contract in such a position. Additionally, an Austrian radiologist, Hermann Moedder, experimented with medical students in the 40's, hanging them by their wrists with their hands directly above their heads.
In a few minutes, the students became pale, their lung capacity dropped from 5.2 to 1.5 liters, blood pressure decreased and the pulse rate increased. Moedder concluded that inability to breathe would occur in about six minutes if they were not allowed to stand and rest.

The same would apply to Christ, IF he were suspended on a stake, hung from hands bound directly overhead. He would have suffocated in a matter of minutes.

Zugibe, however, discovered that if students were hung by hands outstretched to the side at 60-70 degrees, they would have no trouble breathing for hours on end. Since Luke 23:44 and Matthew 27:45,46 show that Christ was on the cross for about three hours, the evidence points again to death on a traditional cross.
Zugibe carried out his experiments using a number of volunteers who were willing to try hanging from a cross with several variations, none requiring the mutilation of their flesh or bodily damage. Special leather gloves were used to attach the hands to the crossbeam. To demonstrate that a nail through the hand could hold several hundred pounds, Zugibe, in another experiment, used the severed arms of fresh cadavers, nailing them through either of two locations in the palm of the hands (see illustration) and suspending weights from the arms (a rather gruesome experiment, to say the least!).

If Jesus did not die of asphyxiation, then what was the cause of his death? Let's review the events of the day Christ died.

First, Jesus experienced loss in blood volume both from perspiration and from the sweating of blood, due to his mental anguish. After being arrested, he was scourged with a leather whip that had metal weights or bone chips at the ends. As the tips penetrated the skin, the nerves, muscles and skin were traumatized. Exhaustion with shivering, severe sweating, and seizures would follow. Much body fluid would be lost. Even before being hung on the cross, Jesus may have already entered a state of shock, due to the scourging, the irritation of the nerves of the scalp due to the crown of thorns, and by being struck several times. Finally, he was nailed to the cross by large, square iron nails driven through both hands, as well as his feet. The damage to the nerves brought incredible pain, adding to the shock and loss of water. Over a period of three hours, every slight move would have brought excruciating pain. Death would result from extreme shock due to a combination of exhaustion, pain and loss of blood.

Daddy JAM and Sarah...They're Struzzin! 

Another Cloudy Dreary Day...."It's Ohio!"

What thoughts for today???The Bad...I found out I have 3 ruptured disc and need surgery next month...there goes the summer....My good friend's wife just lost her job and is down in the dumps..My other good friend's mom has a mass and scheduled for surgery Friday...There's always something negative going on...BUT.....
The Good...I am alive and in Christ and I know I will get through this and should still have time to go fishhing this summer "Yeah!" I will be playing guitar back on the Praise team a couple of weeks after surgery "What a blessing!" I have wonderful friends and church family to pray for me and help me out getting back on my feet.."Awesome!" I get to pray for my friends and their needs "Is that Cool or What!!!" Jesus is Alive and my dearest friend as I think about how He died on the cross for me. That's what Easter is about "Speechless!!!!!!"

And the very best..ever, ever...I will get to spend Enternity with Him "Imagine That!!!!!!!!!!!"

AGAIN A THOUGHT FROM TODAYS DEVOTION:
You know sometimes you wonder when God speaks to you...Well He never stops. As I read from Psalms: 119 "I will walk at liberty, for I seek Your precepts," he wrote. "I will speak of Your testimonies also before kings, and will not be ashamed. And I will delight myself in Your commandments, which I love. . . . And I will meditate on Your statutes" (vv.45-47). That's it!!! I just need to seek Him in His word...His commandments.....His testimonies....THE BIBLE!!! So I am as guilty as the next not spending enough time in the Bible...I really don't have a good excuse as I definately have time....I love it when God talks to me!!!!

So those of you with problems...I can say under authority, God will not let you down!

Preach it Brother ELVIS!!

Another praise....Jason and Sarah got their siding on the house before the baby arrived...Jason got his raise they prayed for....I am so glad The Spot has let me share in others blessings..Hey Yo Daddy JAM!!!!

Yo ELVIS 

Today's Devotion

Who would have thought, "we blog at Highpoint"? God provides new things for us to use. We either try to repell it or we understand new things as tools to be used. I reflect on today's devotion as I read Judges 13:15-23--Manoah and his wife encountered His being as He was wisp away in the flames and smoke.....and to think today we experience Jesus in our personal way that we too can express "We are in the Presence of God!" Jesus made this possible so we can truly every second of the day be in His presence. God has revealed through Jesus on the cross His true compassion and love He has for us.....So guess what??? "We are in the Presence of our Father!!"

This Blog allows comments from everyone, so let's have fun and express God in us to each other!

Dooooope!