They seem like two completely unrelated terms, don’t they?

Pressure … meaning hard times, difficult situations, heavy loads.

Diamonds … precious stones held in high esteem by most of mankind.

Yet science tells us this is a fact.

I quote an online academic source: “Diamonds and coal are both, at their base, different forms of the element carbon (C on the periodic table). And pressure is indeed a key part of what turns decaying carbon-based life forms such as plants into coal, as well as what turns carbon into diamonds.”

Now let’s turn from the physical aspect of God’s Creation to the spiritual side of His Doings.

It is also true that God often uses the “pressures” (the hard times and difficult circumstances) of life to produce within us “gold,” and maybe “fine gold” at that!

Listen to the Patriarch Job: “But He (the Lord) knoweth the way that I take: when He hath tried me (pressure), I shall come forth as GOLD.” Job 23:10

Wow!

The Apostle Paul now tells us: “For our light affliction (pressure), which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory (gold).” 2 Corinthians 4:17

God sends us through the fire to purify us! To build us! To purify us! To beautify us!

Now let’s go to the Psalms!

“O God of my righteousness: thou hast enlarged me (maturity, purity, like gold) when I was in distress (under pressure).” Psalm 4:1

Again … “It is good for me that I have been afflicted (pressure); that I might learn thy statutes (better than gold).” Psalm 119:71

Even Jesus, when on earth two thousand years ago! “Though he were a Son, yet learned he obedience (gold, pure gold) by the things which he suffered (pressure).” Hebrews 5:8

Christian friends, let us not waste our trials, the pressures God allows us to endure, sends our direction!

Let’s obediently and humbly turn turn into profit!

Like … “gold, silver and precious stones.” 1 Corinthians 3:12

Praise the Lord!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

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The King James Bible is amazing. Even its phraseology I love. And today’s Thought is an example.

King David is praying: “But thou, O LORD, art a shield for me; my glory, and the lifter up of mine head.” Psalm 3:3

Yes, God is our Shield. (Here the Holy Spirit is using he Hebrew word for a huge protective covering that virtually surrounds the front of one’s body!) God, our Protector!

And yes, God is our Glory! (The noun means something very important, very heavy to our minds and hearts and lives, appreciable!) He is the most important Person in our lives!

But yes as well … “O LORD, Thou art THE LIFTR UP OF MY HEAD.”

That’s what has caught my attention this morning. He is my powerful “Lifter Up!” Giver of strength!

The word construction “lifter up” translates the verb “rum,” which means “to rise, to exalt, to hold up!” (It’s pronounced “room.”) And it is here framed as a Hiphil participle. This indicates that there is a “cause,” a “reason” that God is so encouraging us, so fortifying us. (Because we are His children, in His Family!) It also being a participle hints at “ongoing action.” He does not “lift us up” just once, or just a few times” … but habitually!

Wow!

In fact, one way of looking at the Ministry of God the Holy Spirit in the very day we live … is that He is God’s Divinely Sent “Lifter Up” of our heads and hearts and spirits … time and time again!

Jesus’ favorite Name for the Holy Spirit was “Comforter.” One who gives us strength and aid and courage!

Yes, that is “lifting up” for sure!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

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I realize this makes two new Lessons in a row, on consecutive days. And my plan now is a Bible Study every other day here on the Website. But somehow I got out of sync! I need to share a written Lesson here on the days I do not post a video Lesson (an Evening Meditation). Hence, today’s Thought. Trying to get things back in proper order …

(Last night the Evening Meditation discussed Jude Verse 11. Well worth watching if you’re concerned about the pandemic of people departing from the Faith! To watch or listen, just visit our YouTube channel, Dr. Mike Bagwell.)

Psalm 2 has God saying, in response to the rebellion of the world: “Yet have I set my king upon MY HOLY HILL of Zion.” God the Father plans to send Jesus (God the Son) back to earth to straighten out the chaotic, sinful failure man has created.

“King Jesus,” God declares!

But look (the thrust of today’s Lesson) WHERE God is going to plant Jesus as King of Kings!

“Upon MY HOLY HILL called ZION!”

Students, that’s in Israel!

More precisely, that’s in Jerusalem!

And God just called it HIS!

God owns all the earth, true. “The earth is the LORD’S, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein.” Psalm 24:1

But specifically, God claims Israel as HIS!

Speaking to the Jews of the “Holy Land,” God firmly asserts … “The land shall not be sold for ever: FOR THE LAND IS MINE; for ye (the Jews) are strangers and sojourners with me.” Leviticus 25:23

Rebellious man may say he is going TO TAKE that Land from the people of God … but I imagine he is in for a rude awakening!

“MY HOLY HILL!”

God is King of that Mountain!

Woe be to the man or woman or religion or army or armies that tries to wrest it out of His Hand!

Not politics folks, just BIBLE!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

“Rejoice, O ye nations, with his people (Israel): for he will avenge the blood of his servants, and will render vengeance to his adversaries, and will be merciful unto HIS LAND, and to his people.” Deuteronomy 32:43, God’s Land!

And this great God, according to the Bible, has given HIS LAND to the JEWS, to the ISRAELITES! “The WHOLE LAND OF CANAAN, where you now reside as a foreigner, I WILL GIVE (hence, God is the Owner) as an EVERLASTING POSSESSION to you (Israel) and your descendants after you; and I will be their God.” Genesis 17:8, God promising Abraham!

The facts are clear!

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Psalm 1 ends with a stark reminder: “The LORD knoweth the WAY of the righteous: but the WAY of the ungodly shall perish.” Psalm 1:6

Do you see there two “ways?”

Man’s “way” and God’s “Way!”

The “way” of the ungodly and the “Way” of the righteous!

I should remove the conjunction “and” in these foregoing Lines and insert the conjunction “or!” It’s a choice. One OR the other!

The saved man or woman walks in the “way of the righteous.” The lost man or woman walks in the “way of the ungodly.”

You might be asking, “What does it matter?”

The way of the righteous leads to HEAVEN!

The way of the ungodly leads to HELL!

Jesus is preaching here: “Enter ye in at the strait gate: for wide is the gate, and broad is the WAY, that leadeth to destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: because strait is the gate, and narrow is the WAY, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.” Matthew 7:13-14

On which WAY are you, this 26th day of May, 2021?

Actually, the Bible “WAY” is not just a location, a manner of life … IT IS A PERSON!

And His Name is JESUS. “I am the Way,” He boldly proclaimed when He walked the earth two thousand years ago! See John 14:6.

Do you know HIM?

If not, let me quote His gracious Words one more time, John 5:24.

“Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that heareth my word, and believeth on him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation; but is passed from death unto life.”

Obey His Instructions here … and you will walk the “way of the righteous!” You will go to Heaven when you die.

He has promised!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

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My point this morning …

As Christians, there are some things we that we do not know! And will never know until certain events come to pass!

For example, in 1 John 3:2 we read … Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be ….”

I do not know a lot about the future body I will inhabit. That “glorified body” we are promised after death! Again, I am writing to Believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. Or about my future home in Glory. “It doth not yet appear what we shall be!”

Wow!

Another example, I do not know when my Lord is coming again! Matthew 24:36 teaches me: “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.” With this Fact, with these Words of Jesus, I must rest content.

I do not know much about death either. I have never experienced it. But will, unless the Rapture occurs first. I am aware however “It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment.” Hebrews 9:27

And that … “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me.” Psalm 23:4

Other than that, death is an “unknown.” I do know that the “sting” of death is gone as well. Because of Jesus’ Death and Burial and Resurrection! (1 Corinthians 15:55)

All right, you may be saying by now.

Actually, I can’t type all the things which “I do not know” (at least not fully) as a Christian, as a Bible Believer.

And that limited ignorance (limited knowledge) is a fact, surely, for a reason, for some important reason.

That reason being … when I do not know, I can TRUST my Lord! My Lord WHO DOES KNOW!

Again let me say it: I CAN TRUST!

One more verb … I CAN TRUST AND OBEY!

Deuteronomy 29:29 suns the Lesson well … “The secret things belong unto the LORD our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.”

Amen!

— Dr. Mike Bagwell

My favorite hymn in all the Songbook is “I know Whom I have believed!” Its verses list many things we do not know … then repeats the glorious fact that WE DO KNOW Jesus Christ the Son of God and our dear Lord!

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