Joy of the Lord - yet grieving as well

Today I went to a Bible Study that Mimi Wilson was leading (the cookbook author). She talked about the Joy of the Lord. She first talked about the fact that God shows emotion and then talked about joy. A couple of interesting things she said were:

- In Ezekiel 9:3, 10:18, and 11:22 the glory of the Lord was removed from the temple and from Jerusalem and was last mentioned as being on a mountain to the east of Jerusalem. In Luke 19:37-44, Jesus was on the Mount of Olives, to the east of Jerusalem and he wept over Jerusalem. He, God, had returned to Jerusalem but they did not recognize him nor did they receive him. (John 1:11)

- In John 11 we again see that Jesus wept. A question was once raised: What is more incredible? A man raised from the dead or an eternal, holy God who weeps?

- The angels sang for Joy when man was created (Job 38:6-7) Jesus endured the cross because of the Joy of redeeming man (Heb. 12:2) There is Joy every time a sinner repents – it is God who does the rejoicing in the presence of the angels (Luke 15:8-10)

- In Jesus’ final words to the disciples and prayer for them, Jesus offers them the Joy of the Lord which comes through hearing and obeying the word of God and abiding with him. (John 15 -17)

- Where do we look for “Joy” – in worldly pleasures? Relationships? We should rather find real Joy in our relationship with Jesus and in serving him to bring others into the kingdom.

She also gave a good illustration that I hadn't thought of before. She has Parkinson's Disease and takes medication daily. However, this medicine only covers the symptoms, it doesn't cure the disease. This is much the same as the sacrifices of the Old Testament. The blood of the lamb covered the sin of the people but didn't cure it. These sacrifices had to be over and over again. But, Jesus' sacrifice on the cross cures our sin problem! His blood takes it away - once for all! Amen!!

We heard sad news this afternoon. There was a Swiss girl, Corina, 24 yrs. old, who had come to Rwanda as a medical student to do an internship. Less than a month after being here, she became sick and was treated for malaria. However, her condition worsened drastically and she was transported to Kigali where she was practically dead. She was airlifted out of Kigali to Nairobi where there was some sign of hope and she was able to respond by wiggling fingers but was still very sick. We haven’t heard exactly what she was sick from – an infection most likely. Her parents and boyfriend flew in from Switzerland to be with her. Many missionaries donated blood for her. Many, many prayed for her but yesterday she died. We do not understand why but we trust in God’s sovereignty. At this point, we do not know if she or her family are believers but we do know that her family has been staying at Mayfield Guesthouse where there were Christians to be around them and pray for them. Our prayer now is that they will allow themselves to be drawn into the arms of God. There was also a young Swiss man who was working with her who will be dramatically impacted by this. Please pray for all concerned.

Mark went to a hardware store this morning that he has been shopping at a lot lately and was able to talk with the owner for a little bit. She is Asian decent (Pakistani or Indian) but was born and raised in Rwanda. Mark explained to her that he is here to oversee the construction of a Bible School and she had no idea what a “Bible School” was. Pray that Mark will be a witness to this family. The reason Mark went there was to buy more gutters for the back of the house and parts for our bathroom sink. Now the small bathroom sink has a leaky faucet….