Return from being captive! That's God's promise!

Please click this link for the video version of today's blog :

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6K1cj06l6KY

Bishop Silas conducting Vancouver Oratorio Society, VOS Chamber and Schola Cantorum singing Parry's I was Glad:

https://youtu.be/Qr4RThsdEjY?si=wh3sT_i3QE8kTgX6

Bishop Silas conducting Schola Cantorum Emmanuel and Vancouver Oratorio Chamber Choir singing Palestrina's O Beata Trinitas:

https://youtu.be/O4wiyr8oa_Y?si=l_cp4aRfVMRzaL6b

Silence

1. Put on your “brakes” and stop for a moment of silence

2. Wait for God. Breathe deep for God's peace and feel His presence. Exhale your worries.

Praise and Thanksgiving

1. Think through your day, all the times that made you smile.

2. Thank God for all those moments, and for all those people

3. **Sing a song to praise the Lord

Please click this link to worship with us -

Be with You: City Harvest Church, Singapore

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Epkh71WTUFs&list=RDEpkh71WTUFs&start_radio=1

10,000 Reasons

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r3K3roEF36k

Confession and Repentance (Subjective Shifting Devotion Method)

https://bishopsilas.blogspot.com/2009/08/count-down-5-subject-shifting-devotion.html

1. Pray for the Holy Spirit to shine on you that you are able to discover your sins and be willing to repent:

“Dear Holy Spirit, shine your light into the places of darkness in my life. Show me my sins, everything that blocks me from encountering God and having Jesus as my Lord. In Jesus’ name I pray, Amen.”

2. Through the Holy Spirit, examine yourself for a short silence and then pray:

"Dear Lord Jesus, thank you for dying on the cross for our sins and being victorious over death and sin. I confess my sins to you(pause, to tell Jesus what the Holy Spirit has shown you). Forgive my sins by your blood and help me follow you. Holy Spirit, fill me that I may be able to receive your gifts to love God and His people. In Jesus Name I pray, Amen."

3. John Stott's daily prayer of Christlikeness (Christopher J.H. Wright, Cultivating the fruit of the Spirit. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2017, 13)

**Please click this link to read how God used John Stott to change my life:https://bishopsilas.blogspot.com/2009/07/

"Heavenly Father, I pray that this day I may live in your presence and please you more and more.

Lord Jesus, I pray that this day I may take up my cross and follow you.

Holy Spirit, I pray that this day you will fill me with yourself and cause your fruit to ripen in my life: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control."

Today's Time with Abba: Psalm 116:7-14, Jeremiah 28:1-29:32; 1 Timothy 1:1-20; Proverbs 25:17

Please click this link for today's Time with Abba one year Bible: http://twa.pastoralcareschool.org/

To know, learn and practice the method of Time with Abba, please click this link:http://twa.pastoralcareschool.org/

Key passage:

“ This is what the Lord says: “When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my good promise to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you. You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back from captivity. I will gather you from all the nations and places where I have banished you,” declares the Lord, “and will bring you back to the place from which I carried you into exile.”

Jeremiah 29:10-14

Let's have a time to be still and give the Holy Spirit space to speak through today's TWA passages we have just read. Offer this time to Jesus as you listen to Him.

The topic I received today from Jesus is: Return from being captive! That's God's promise!

To recap yesterday's message of Jeremiah chapter 26 of a time when the Kingdom of Judah was going to be destroyed. If King Jehoiakim listened and obeyed to God's voice through Jeremiah, they won't be destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon eleven years later (586BC) and God's people won't be captive for 70 years!

Today's Jeremiah 29:10-14 helps us to feel deeply of God's mercy and grace!

When God's people cried out painfully for His salvation and willing to repent of their sins, God listened and acted. They could return to Jerusalem to rebuild the Holy City and the Holy Temple after 70 years of being captive and lived in a Babylonian culture!

Actually this world is being captive by Babylonian culture long time ago!

What is Babylonian culture?

Very simple! Babylonian culture is a culture opposite to God's Kingdom culture. Those people living the lifestyle of Babylonian culture are living in a way opposite to God's character and standard, pursuing a life like what King Solomon says in Ecclesiastes, a lifestyle of luxury, sexual immorality, money and power, self-center, but "meaningless" !

May we have an awakening in the midst of this dark world full of all kinds of disaster to understand that God allows this to happen is for us to have an opportunity, a diamond opportunity to get away from being captive by this rotten Babylonian culture to return back to God's Kingdom culture and authority!

Dear Lord Jesus,

Help us to have an awakening to get away from being captive by this rotten Babylonian culture to return back to your Kingdom culture and authority. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.