2 MIRACLES - 1 FRIDAY & 1 TODAY - 4/13/24
The day began with a conundrum..
Background: I have an old friend who is the director of a Christian orphanage in Kenya. In Kenya they have all too frequent disasters.. floods, insect invasions, fires..
Then, I support a saint in Pakistan, though I’ve not met the man in person, who conducts the Children’s church in his town. In Pakistan Christians suffer assaults by unfriendly neighbors, even to the burning down of their churches - besides that they are an oppressed group already.
BOTH of these friends need to learn of the power base of the Disciples of Jesus Christ. They need the baptism in the holy spirit - ‘How to receive it’, and ‘What to do with it, after they’ve got it’.
Just a few days ago, my Christian brother in Pakistan went me a video to show me how they were water baptizing the children.
Sounds nice.. but, sorry, does nothing. Which in a direct way demonstrates why the Christians in Pakistan remain oppressed, and Kenyans continue to suffer disasters. (I’m not going to get into that here except to say that Water Baptism is a nice religious show - that confers nothing; not spirit, and not power; It was replaced by the Baptism by FIRE, ( Acts 1:5 and Acts 11:16) though you’d never know it. Even missionaries going overseas from the USA keep the myth of water baptism alive to the detriment of their foreign charges).
The thing is.. it dawned on me that these 2 should come and take the Bible class starting this week - that focuses on the POWER of the holy spirit.
JESUS DIDN’T COMMAND US TO BE ENDUED WITH POWER, BECAUSE THERE WAS NONE TO USE.
(Read Luke 10:19 as a rule).
Turned out to be too late for Pakistan this go around, because a visa would take weeks. But Gladys in Kenya already has a visa.. all she needed was airline tickets!
So I created a crowd funding page on Give Send Go. Between that page and some private donations, I raised nearly enough buy Gladys airline tickets from Kenya.
MIRACLE #1.
Give Send Go won’t release our funds till Monday, July 15th, but I was able to go ahead and send Gladys the money to buy her airfare, because - where only recently we were sort of ‘strapped’,.. FINALLY a payment on a completed mural project - (that my son’s dad did for a world famous DC restaurant, Cafe Milano, came in!) Right in the Nick of time! So we put up the funds for Gladys to get her airline tickets!
CONUNDRUM
I reasoned that Gladys should choose her own tickets.. since it also involves coordinating a 4 hour bus ride to the airport in Nairobi, and involves ‘Kenya time’.. So rather than play a telephone game, I sent the funds to her, and supplied our address, and told her the day to arrive.
So… she bought tickets to the wrong airport.
She asked me.. ‘Does New York have more than one airport?’… (haha ouch)
We do. And the internation airport up here, is 20 minutes from my house.
Even her travel agent didn’t seem to think to look at our address and check for close airports.
And somehow I MANAGED to not THINK of telling her the name of our airport. A perfect storm. (/ :>{ )
UPSHOT: Her tickets are to JFK.. → 6 hours away from here, without traffic.. And the tickets couldn’t be changed..
We looked at the cost of flights between the airports - It was an astonishing $500 ONE Way! I did not have that, nor did I think it was a good idea.
You know what came to mind? George Mueller! Remember the time he was on a ship at sea, and thick fog stopped the ship, and he needed to be in Canada on time for a conference.. He told the ship captain (who expressed helplessness), “THEN GOD WILL FIND ANOTHER WAY”. (Huh? Another way? This is before helicopters..) But I took my hint from George and told Glady’s ‘WE’LL FIND A WAY TO GET YOU TO FAYETTEVILLE!’. ( 6 hours northwest of JFK International Airport…through NYC traffic)
REMEMBER → THEN GOD WILL FIND ANOTHER WAY
MIRACLE #2 - ANDRE HAD A BRAINSTORM! OUR SON NICK IS IN CONNECTICUT!
Our son is in Old Saybrook Connecticut this weekend with old friends of ours. He went to Connecticut for a job interview as a building contractor. And was supposed to return on Sunday... (He’s raising funds to go back to school) (Are there no jobs near my house? Well, very few contractor concerns really, and Nick did work for a few, and got tired of hearing the ‘F’ word ever few seconds..)
Andre & I looked at Old Saybrook on a map...
KENNEDY AIRPORT IS PRACTICALLY RIGHT ON HIS WAY HOME!! GLADYS IS ARRIVING ON MONDAY! He just stays in Connecticut one extra night!
Why didn’t I THINK of it?
Why didn’t I GIVE Gladys the name of the right airport to begin with?
Well, it has a lot to do with spinning plates and some brain cramp lately.. but I have no excuse really.
Thank GOD I have GOD! (Who picks up where I leave off).
“And he said unto me,
My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness.
Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.’ II Corinthians 12:9
HAHAHAH! I can mess up and see miracles as a consequence.. HAAHAHA!
SO Guess who is going to pick Gladys up at the airport on Monday and drive her home with him, getting her to the class on time!………
Bless Nikolai, and bless God forever.
Hallelujah!!🙏🏼🙏🏼🙏🏼🤍🤍🤍
"How come Jesus was water baptized?"
As he said to John, "It is needful to fulfill all righteousness."
He said also at another time.. "I came not to abolish the law but to fulfill it".
Jesus, Paul told us, was the 'end of the law for all who believe".
This is why we no longer need to be physically circumcised. He fulfilled that law.
Nor do we perform animal sacrifices.
Paul explained this in Hebrews chapters 8,9, and 10,.. calling the things of the old Covenant..'patterns'.. and 'templates'. In Hebrews 10:1 he said these were 'shadows of the true".
What that means, is that when the true came.. the shadows were supposed to help God's people recognize them.. having been the 'patterns' ..
But with the true.. the old was done away with. Again explaining Acts 1:5 ... etc.
And Ephesians 4:5.. ONE baptism.
Not two.