2 Cor 3:18 – “But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.”
Excellent commentator John Gill discusses this verse this way:
But we all with open face
beholding as in a glass;
not of the law, but of the Gospel, and the ordinances of it; not with the eyes of their bodies, but with the eyes of their understandings, with the eye of faith; which sight is spiritual, delightful, and very endearing; throws a veil over all other objects, and makes souls long to be with Christ: the object beheld is
the glory of the Lord;
Jesus Christ: not the glory of his human nature, which lies in its union to the Son of God, and in its names which it has by virtue of it; and in its being the curious workmanship of the Spirit of God, and so is pure and holy, and free from all sin; and was outwardly beautiful and glorious, and is so at the right hand of God, where we see him by faith, crowned with glory and honour; and shall behold him with the eyes of our bodies, and which will be fashioned like to his glorious body; but this sight and change are not yet: rather the glory of his divine nature is meant, which is essential and underived, the same with his Father’s; is ineffable, and incomprehensible; it appears in the perfections he is possessed of, and in the worship given to him; it was manifested in the doctrines taught, and in the miracles wrought by him; there were some breakings forth of this glory in his state of humiliation, and were beheld by the apostles, and other believers, who saw his glory, as the glory of the only begotten of the Father.
Though the glory of Christ as Mediator, being full of grace and truth, seems to be chiefly designed; this he has from God, and had it from everlasting; this he gives to his people, and is what makes him so glorious, lovely, and desirable in their eye: and whilst this delightful object is beheld by them, they are
changed into the same image;
there was a divine image in man, in his first creation; this image was defaced by sin, and a different one took place; now in regeneration another distinct from them both is stamped, and this is the image of Christ; he himself is formed in the soul, his grace is wrought there; so that it is no wonder there is a likeness between them; which lies in righteousness and holiness, and shows itself in acts of grace, and a discharge of duty. The gradual motion of the change into this image is expressed by this phrase,
from glory to glory:
not from the glory of the law to the glory of the Gospel; or from the glory of Moses to the glory of Christ;
rather from the glory that is in Christ, to a glory derived in believers from him; or which seems most agreeable, from one degree of grace to another, grace here being signified by glory; or from glory begun here to glory perfect hereafter; when this image will be completed, both in soul and body; and the saints will be as perfectly like to Christ, as they are capable of, and see him as he is:
by the Lord of the Spirit,
I believe this verse says that as we look into Christ Jesus, we are thereby, over time, changed more and more into His image. At first, we are babes in Christ — have all the parts of a human, but just not fully grown. Studying about and meditating on Christ helps make us more and more like Him, and so it follows, the more this is done, the more it can occur, as the Holy Spirit works.
Puritan Thomas Manton, through his commentary on Isaiah 53, goes through a deep, discovering look at Christ, His sufferings, sacrifice and conquest, but in a very applicative way. Mr. Manton does not simply commentate on the scriptures themselves, but gives practical applications throughout, which I have found exalt Christ to greater levels, and help bring us to a more humble approach to Christ and living our lives.
I believe this study is such a critical one, and I would hope you would take the time to go through it.
Again, I hope you will take the time to go through it. May God guide our studies, may He grant us an increase in the knowledge and understanding of who He is and who we are, may He in our lives daily increase and we decrease, and may He mold us daily more and more into His image as we look into the Lord Christ Jesus and His glory!
We spent a lot of time last year cleaning up around here, and part of that was clearing out the barn. And part of that was wanting to move stuff we were going to keep up into the loft, but there wasn’t much room left, so the plan was to go vertical and add shelves!
And here’s how building the first set unfolded…
Here’s part of the wood stack:
And the first frame. I doubled the long boards because I was planning to span 5 feet between support posts. And I put the cross pieces 16 on center:
I set each leg with screws and then bolted them with 3/8 inch lag screws:
I used the speed square to try to square up the leg:
Here are all 3 legs on one side:
And then I flipped it over:
And did the other 3 legs:
And then turned the whole thing upright:
Then, after building the other 2 shelves, and with the help of the guys here, we attached the other shelves:
I also added leg braces at the bottom:
Several of the turkeys roost in the loft at night, and here are the natural results of their eating! 😀 Straight to the compost pile!
And here are the shelves done:
And then loaded with “stuff”! 🙂
We are thankful to the Lord for granting the resources to further organize here and store His blessings of provisions!
I’ve been through an excellent book from Puritan Thomas Brooks called “Precious Remedies Against Satan’s Devices”, where he identifies the various ways Satan goes about his work, and offers remedies to help against those devices.
I believe it’s important we are aware of these things, as the Bible says:
1 Peter 5:8 – “Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour:“
And we are to resist…
James 4:7 – “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.“
Ephesians 6:11 – “Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil.“
…but only with God’s help:
Psalm 28:7 – “The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in him, and I am helped: therefore my heart greatly rejoiceth; and with my song will I praise him.“
Below is another device of Satan to draw a person to sin, sin being something we should hate in ourselves since sin is against God and hated by God as well. The device is to get us to shy away from afflictions and difficulties of life, but the remedy is to understand and welcome the loving, chastising hand of our heavenly Father!
And the worst thing possible for a man is to be left to himself to commit sin:
Rom 1:18-32:
18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;
19 Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.
20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
21 Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
22 Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
23 And changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things.
24 Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves:
25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
26 For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature:
27 And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet.
28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient;
29 Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers,
30 Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents,
31 Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful:
32 Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them.
Ps 81:10-16:
10 I am the Lord thy God, which brought thee out of the land of Egypt: open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it.
11 But my people would not hearken to my voice; and Israel would none of me.
12 So I gave them up unto their own hearts’ lust: and they walked in their own counsels.
13 Oh that my people had hearkened unto me, and Israel had walked in my ways!
14 I should soon have subdued their enemies, and turned my hand against their adversaries.
15 The haters of the Lord should have submitted themselves unto him: but their time should have endured for ever.
16 He should have fed them also with the finest of the wheat: and with honey out of the rock should I have satisfied thee.
I’ve included the other remedy points below for context, but for this blog post am just focusing on Remedy 3. However, you can listen to the whole section in this audio reading (it starts with Device 7):
The eighth device that Satan hath to draw the soul to sin, is,
Device (8). By representing to the soul the outward mercies that vain men enjoy, and the outward miseries that they are freed from, while they have walked in the ways of sin.
Says Satan, Do you see, O soul, the many mercies that such and such enjoy, that walk in those very ways that your soul startles to think of, and the many crosses that they are delivered from, even such as makes other men, that say they dare not walk in such ways, to spend their days in sighing, weeping, groaning, and mourning, and therefore, says Satan, if ever you would be freed from the dark night of adversity, and enjoy the sunshine of prosperity, you must walk in their ways.
[Footnote: It was a weighty saying of Seneca, there is nothing more unhappy than he who never felt adversity. Some of the heathens would be wicked as their gods were, counting it a dishonour to their god to be unlike him. – Lactantius.]
By this stratagem the devil took those in Jer. xliv. 16-18, ‘As for the word that thou hast spoken unto us in the name of the Lord, we will not hearken unto thee: but we will certainly do whatsoever thing goeth forth of our mouth, to burn incense unto the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink-offerings unto her, as we have done, we, and our fathers, our kings, and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem: for then had we plenty of victuals, and were well, and saw no evil. But since we left off to burn incense to the queen of heaven, and to pour out drink-offerings unto her, we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine.’
This is just the language of a world of ignorant, profane, and superstitious souls in London, and England, that would have made them a captain to return to bondage, yea, to that bondage that was worse than that the Israelites groaned under. Oh, say they, since such and such persons have been put down, and left off, we have had nothing but plundering and taxing, and butchering of men, etc.; and therefore we will do as we, and our kings, and nobles, and fathers have formerly done, for then had we plenty at home, and peace abroad, etc., and there was none to make us afraid.
[Footnote: It is said of one of the emperors, that Rome had no war in his days, because it was plague enough to have such an emperor. You are wise, and know how to apply it. [The allusion, no doubt, is to Charles I., and the agitation for the Restoration of Charles II. Cromwell died Sept. 3. 1658. – Editor]]
Remedy (1). That no man knows how the heart of God stands by his hand. [ie. people cannot know how God feels about them just by how things are happening in their lives]
Remedy (2). That there is nothing in the world that does so provoke God to be wroth and angry, as men’s taking encouragement from God’s goodness and mercy to do wickedly.
Remedy (4). That the wants [lacks] of wicked man, under all their outward mercy and freedom from adversity, is far greater than all their outward enjoyments.
Remedy (5). That outward things are not as they seem and esteemed.
Remedy (6). Consider the end [purpose] and design of God is heaping up mercy upon the heads of the wicked, and in giving them a rest and quiet from those sorrows and sufferings that others sigh under.
Remedy (7). That God does often most plague and punish [with spiritual judgements] those whom others think he does most spare and love [because of their temporal ease].
Remedy (8). Dwell more upon that strict account that vain men must make [on judgement day] for all that good that they do enjoy.
Remedy (3). The third remedy against this device of Satan is, solemnly to consider,
That there is no greater misery in this life, than not to be in misery; no greater affliction, than not to be afflicted.
Woe, woe to that soul that God will not spend a rod upon! This is the saddest stroke of all, when God refuses to strike at all: Hos. iv. 17, ‘Ephraim is joined to idols; let him alone.’ ‘Why should you be smitten any more? you will revolt more and more,’ Isa. i. 5.
When the physician gives over the patient, you say, ‘Ring out his knell, the man is dead.’ So when God gives over a soul to sin without control, you may truly say, ‘This soul is lost’, you may ring out his knell, for he is twice dead, and plucked up by the roots.
Freedom from punishment is the mother of security, the step-mother of virtue, the poison of religion, the moth of holiness, and the introducer of wickedness. ‘Nothing,’ said one, ‘seems more unhappy to me, than he to whom no adversity hath happened’.
Outward mercies ofttimes prove a snare to our souls. ‘I will lay a stumbling-block,’ Ezek. iii. 20. Vatablus’ note there is, ‘I will prosper him in all things, and not by affliction restrain him from sin.’
Prosperity has been a stumbling-block, at which millions have stumbled and fallen, and broke the neck of their souls for ever.
[Footnote: Religion brought forth riches, and the daughter soon devoured the mother, said Augustine.]
May the God of infinite mercies never leave us to ourselves, to walk in our own ways! And may we be thankful to Him for His loving, chastising hand!
Heb 12:6 – For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
Rev 3:19 – As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten: be zealous therefore, and repent.
Just recently, Sue came briskly walking up to the house, which usually means something’s wrong on the homestead. I braced myself and went out to meet her and asked her what was wrong. But what ended up being “wrong”, or at least of some immediate attention, was that she discovered a chicken mommy in the barn loft with a whole batch of chicks with her! Near the edge of the loft too, which is probably 10 feet off the ground! Wow!
Here’s a picture of the stairs going up to the loft — she made her nest way in the back corner there by the buckets:
We went up there, and sure enough — a bunch of them! They had at least moved away from the edge, and so we grabbed mama and put her in a cage for the moment, and then gathered up her little ones into a pet carrier, and put them all into the brooder barn (formerly the summer kitchen).
And here they are now! We believe there are 15, and it appears the hen hatched out all the eggs that were under her. She must have just been dropping eggs into her nest herself, and then did the sitting. This mother is a good one too — very often broody:
And here’s their video:
We are very thankful to the Lord for this unexpected gift to start this 2020, and for the safe hatching, and that He had mama set on the nest in the barn! We pray they are used for His glory in some way, and the benefit of the homestead and others, as He wills!
Middle Fall rolled around this 2019, and it was time to put our billy goats with their respective nannies for breeding time! We do it around beginning to mid-November to try to get kid delivery happening after March, because we’ve had snow here into early April before.
Sadly though, our oldest goat this year, Pammy, died early Fall. It was kind of suddenly…just one night in the barn, even all bundled up with sweaters and blankets, so we’re not sure exactly what happened. She had a sweet disposition, was one of the originals here on the land, and will be missed. We thank the Lord for the many kids and much milk He granted from her!
Here she is with her first kid for us, 10 years ago:
And her last ones last year:
What a good mommy! 🙂 Again, we are thankful to God.
But time continues, and it was time to put the goats together. We are down to 5 females now, and we really want to keep any next female from Hannah, the most LaMancha female we have, and so with Pammy gone, we moved Lucy to be with the “older” group (Hannah & Annie) with Shakespeare, and kept the 2 sisters, Adeline and Nellie, to be with Elvis:
Here’s Shakespeare:
And Elvis, sans his horns. If you read last year’s breeding time blog post, we talk about how Elvis was going after Marie and using his horns as weapons. Well, in the off season, we took him to the vet, and polled him, and now he can’t do that. 🙂 We’re thankful this worked, as we were not going to be able to keep him if it didn’t:
Here’s me getting a shed in place after dragging it behind the truck on our shack caddy from one yard to the other:
And the dogs are ready! (to watch, at least) 🙂
And here is our video of putting the groups together for this year:
As always, we are thankful to the Lord for the provisions of the goats. We pray He might grant kids in Spring, and safe deliveries, and help through the Winter. And again, we are thankful to Him for allowing us to have Pammy and for the provisions He granted from her!
When I was about to prepare to put together our 2019 goat breeding blog post, I realized I had sadly forgotten that I had not put out a blog post about our final little goat provision of the year the Lord had graciously granted! He was born much later than all of the others, so we had to wait to be able to sell him.
And here he is!
And here he is with mama, Hannah. Sue called him “HB” for “Hannah Boy”, and I think I added by calling him “Hannah Boy-berra” 😉 :
Sadly, he didn’t have much time around the other youngin’ goats, but he mixed it up with the best of them as he got older:
And here is his video on sell day. You can tell in it that he had a sweet disposition:
We are always thankful to God for Him granting these provisions out here, and we pray they are a blessing to the new owners, and always used as the Lord would have us use them!
We were thankful to be able to gather together again this past Lord’s Day to sing the praises of God in Psalms from the psalter from Crown & Covenant we use, and to record them to help us all learn them better, and in the hopes that having them available might help someone else. And so we did the next set, Psalms 77A to 78H!
Here are the latest:
(If the above player doesn’t work, you can click the Listen link below; or if you would like to save any of the files locally to your computer, you can right click on Download and click Save As in the popup menu.)
Heb. 11:8-10 - "By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went. By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise: For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God."
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