Dearly beloved,

I know you are trying your best to be good and be kind in everything that you do. It's a good thing, worthy of emulation.

I hope you know that this world is full of imperfect people, even the great people that have good intentions toward you still fail to communicate their intentions as they ought to. Some in the process will hurt you. They may not have meant to hurt you or meant evil, but sometimes, it just happens that way.
You must understand that every man is facing his own Giants and Struggles, and you are not within people's radars most times. Even, the tendency to vex their annoyance on you is there when something does not go their ways. When the ship is down and expectation hit the dead ends, it is human to find someone to blame or shift their anger to.

We are so coward from birth;

Our father was a coward man that could not stand the ground but blamed Eve for his own error. You know through the history of men, it has been few people that has been able to take responsibility for what they did, and those people become a kind of standard for us to follow today. So, remember that I as write this to you, you may also be doing the same to others unknowingly.

There's nothing wrong with you been different!

There's nothing wrong with you trying to follow your heart in all sincerity before God. Try to understand that you cannot please all men even the most anointed person is difficult to please as long his/she lives in this flesh.
Remember our Lord, he was a voice among thousands, if not millions, that went against the status quo. He turned to His own, and they hated Him without a cause. He was wrongly accused, wrongly judged and in the hearts of his own, all manner of presumptions and assumptions were made concerning him.

Remember his word "a man's foes shall be of his household", this word cut across culture, religion, and generation. So prepare your heart to be hurt and wounded in your friend's house. Your brothers and sisters may not (surely, many a time they will not) see what you are seeing and thereby stand against your good intentions but learn to ponder, then forgive and move on.

Upon all that our Master did to His own people, He was repaid with "Death on the Cross", a kind of death that's dished out to the criminals of those days. Don't be surprised if your goodness to this or that brother/sister is repaid with evil, remember you are not greater than your Master.

I must also bring it to your remembrance that; in the process of you trying to do your best with good intentions, some are going to get hurt. Not that you planned to hurt anyone but the planet earth, most time, messes with all of us.
Learn to apologize, but don't throw away your sincerity. Don't be a coward in taking responsibility for your action, be sincere having a good conscience toward God, your Maker.

It is okay for you to stand out in the crowd.
It's normal for some not understand you.
It's very abnormal to live your life in pretense in the name of trying to get favor from men.
Never do anything with or for eyes service, let God be your fear and honor all men.
You're called to only fear the King and honor all men, never lose sight of this like many are doing and are shipwrecking their lives by turning man to their God.
Reverence the Lord in your heart, let him be the judge of all you are doing.
Humans' judgment most time are perverted and corrupt, for we can only see within our scope unless God open our eyes to see beyond the wrong doing of others.

Please, I plead with you, learn to love and be real in your love towards other. Never fake anything, nothing is worth imitating than your Lord. Love is the strong tower, the hidden place that God has secured for His bride. So, you MUST love and live in love no matter what, where and whom you are. Love in the time when it’s pleasant and during unpleasant moment, do not forsake love.

We are all humans with FLAWS and our flaws flow through eternity.
God is perfect, let your trust be in Him. Trust the Lord for you daily needs for He’s the good shepherd.

Depending on man may lead you to your early grave with hurts and regret. If the Lord does not help you, no man, born of a woman can help you. Whatever help you’re receiving from men, know that it comes from God and men are just the avenues/vessels that God uses.
Learn also to appreciate the vessel that pour you water when you are hot and thirsty.
Yes, I know the vessel does not provide the water but it carries the water for you.
It is good to acknowledge the good that has been done to you and to appreciate those vessels that God uses. Don't be so consumed with negative things that has been done to you and lose sight of the goodness you have enjoyed.

Remember, we are imperfect people living in an imperfect world.

Let "Love" guides the way.

May the Lord give you understand of this.



"The woman saith unto him, Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet. Our fathers worshipped in this mountain; and ye say, that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship"

It doesn't take a minute for a believer to be labeled or given a title base on how he/she is view or what such person share or reveal. This has been the danger and peril of 21st century believers, it is a syndrome that's called "too much, too soon". A brother or sister is just getting into knowing the Lord and because of the gifts he/she manifest; titles or offices are erected for him/her. It will soon be that after he/she begins to wallow in such a mentality, the focus is shift from pursuing Christ to the gifts.

While Jesus was trying to point out the issue in this woman's life, she was busy finding a name for Jesus instead of addressing the issues in her life. Then, she brought in the issue of worship and mountains or sects or group because there is no way of having a name without a worship center.
We could recall from the Genesis chapter 11 of how men were trying to make a name for themselves thereby building a tower that could reach to heaven (figuratively) by which every other mortal can worship and pay reverence to them.

It's not far fetch from our generation to quickly identify someone to a building or a group and begin to say "oh, I see that you're from that group" because what people are being fed with is nothing but religion on daily basis and it always have to do with on which mountains to worship? Which sects is the best? Is it called out(s) or denominations? Should we meet under one roof or have elaborate building well-furnished or should we meet under the tree, in a big city or a local town?

On and on the questions go as regards to where to worship, whereas God isn't particular if you meet anywhere, he's more particular with who is doing the worship and is it done in spirit and truth?

While we can keep arguing and debating on which best church to go (If there is anything like that), should we be “called out” or “called In”, should we be denomination or interdenominational, which singer or gospel artist should we follow and listen to, should we do rock and roll or go for slow pace songs that’s called “worship”?

God calls us into a relationship with himself and ask us to stop jumping from one mountain to another. For we are indeed too busy finding something to amuse our curiosity and lack of satisfaction that we often find in the baseless things of all.

As we read the story above, do we realized why Jesus was so particular about the "husband" of this woman despite her having many other sins/vices to be addressed? Why not mention something aside from her having many husbands?

Maybe the story here is to show to us as believers about how we've married to many things, many husbands that are not even ours. Yet, we plunge under their coverings, depending on them for the living water, hoping that they can make us better whereas the one husband we need that will give us the living water has been so abandoned by us. Not only abandoned, but things has been done in His name which has no link to him and yet we attribute both our knowledge of good and evil to him when he has nothing to do with them
.

Why will God leads us into the paths (dimensions) of his righteousness? Because of "Hashem (His name)". Not because of our doing, but simply because He has become our shepherd. The interesting thing is, after a while the sheep can walk in the path that the shepherd has led them through without help because they now have the Shepherd's mind. The sheep becomes mature in discerning what's good and what's evil, what's godly and what's not.

To Abraham, the Lord said "I know Abraham, he will command his household to do all that I've commanded him". We should remember that Abraham didn't start that way. Abraham had to learn obedient. Jesus learned obedient by the things he suffered, the ultimate word he uttered was "Not my will but Your will". One "will" must prevail and it’s going to be the Shepherd's will or else, he isn't the shepherd to begin with.

Learning obedience brings us to verse 4: "Yea, though I walk through the Gey Tzalmavet, I will fear no rah; for You art with me; Your shevet and Your staff they comfort me."..

Let me explain this word "Gey Tzalmavet". Often when we read this word in the King James Version and it means shadow of death. Other translations also have it like that, but what about if we flip the word "Tzalmavet" into reasonable vowel, it will turn to "tzalmut" meaning "Self-image" or "Identity" from the root word "Tzelem" which means God's image.

Let's step backward a bit here for understanding. Shadow of death is not "Death" literary, like many of us believe it to be. It has nothing first and foremost to do with "Death" but it has to do with "Your/our identity". If I were to re-read that verse 4, it would be "though I walk through things that want to proof my identity wrong, I will not be afraid because my identity is secured in my shepherd".

Daily we are bombarded with stuffs that wants to choke our identity in Christ, some even ask us to prove our identity. For example, Satan asked Jesus to prove his identity by turning stone into bread. The emphasis isn't on the bread but on His identity as the Son of God. Many a times, situations and circumstances want us to prove our identity, we can either choose to say "lo ira ra"(I'm not afraid) or we can start by proving ourselves to the situation, the end result of that is Fear.

Sheep has no strength to defend themselves, sheep solely depend on the shepherd to defend them. Time and time again we may try to defend ourselves, we may try prove that we are right while every other person is wrong. The end result of that will be, if we are actually sheep, fear and shame. When we make Christ our Lord, what we are saying as sheep is:

"I don't have my right again, I don't need to prove anything to anyone, I don't have any strength because I have given up, I'm not going to avenge myself of things done to me and so on... I'm just going to be sheep."

David could have dealt with Saul, but he couldn't because he's no longer the master/captain of his ship. At other time someone was cursing him and he replied "allow him, maybe the Lord has asked him to curse me...(See 2 Samuel 16:5)" David of old (remember Abigail and Nabal?) would have avenged himself but God has de-roped him.
He couldn't defend himself again, rather "Hashem" was now His shepherd. Despite his mistakes, the Lord became his shepherd.

Lastly, the rod is for correction while the staff is for comfort and encouragement. "And David encourage himself in the Lord". At other place, "God brought correction to David through Nathan the prophet". There's always a rod for correction for every sheep and staff for comforting the heart of the sheep. Both work together to produce the desired result that the shepherd is looking for in the sheep...

In conclusion, I don't want to re-explain verse 5 and 6.

I just want to mention the latter part of the last verse of that Psalms that reads "I shall dwell in the house of the Lord".

In this dispensation of Grace. We are not to dwell forever in a house built with bricks and blocks as house of the Lord. "We are the House of the Lord". We are the lively stones that's building up a house for the Lord and we've also be made priests and kings to our God. For we are a kingdom of priests not of the Leviticus order, rather of the endless life that's founded in Christ Jesus.

We must daily remind ourselves because it is possible to associate the brick and blocks with God's house. It's very easy to turn a place or a thing to "house of God". God dwell not in in the building built by men, he dwells alone in the house he builds by Himself. "Whose house are we" says Paul. I remember when the Lord started opening my eyes to that truth, he led me to be reciting the last verse as "I am the house of the Lord forever"

Grace and Peace.

Read Part 1 Here and Part 2 Here