Luke 17:2
“It would be better to be thrown into the sea with a large millstone tied around the neck than to face the punishment in store for harming one of these little ones.”

1. Grandpa was tough. He had a lot of experiences that showed how tough he was. He was electrocuted in 1954 while working at the rock crusher plant, he was nearly dragged over a cliff, by a runaway truck at the same plant, and he was caught-up by his denim work shirt in the conveyor system. But, he was also gentle, evidenced by how he loved kids and how they loved him. He was always excited to hold the little ones and he would smile from ear to ear while they were with him. Compare this to our Lord Mt 19:13-14 Then little children were brought to Jesus for him to place his hands on them and pray for them. But the disciples rebuked those who brought them. 14 Jesus said, “Let the little children to come me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”
2. Grandpa was merciful to me when I deserved punishment. Once, about thirty or so years ago, I had my BB gun and took aim at Grandpa’s rain gauge. I didn’t figure I had a chance at hitting it, since I was a fair distance from it and I had only one pump. However, I did hit it and broke it. Nobody saw me do it, so I put the gun away and after awhile we loaded things up and waved goodbye to Grandma & Grandpa until our next trip down from the city. After a couple of months we came back down and I had almost forgotten about the rain gauge incident. But, Grandpa hadn’t. He got the grandkids together in the dining room and brought out the busted gauge and simply asked who was responsible. I quickly owned up to it, not knowing what Grandpa’s reaction would be. As I recall, he told us about responsibility and he told me that he was disappointed with me. But, he didn’t yell. He simply made the point that when I make a bad decision I should address it immediately and not run away from it. Grandpa was like the Lord in showing mercy to me. The lesson of mercy extends beyond that Saturday Afternoon of thirty years ago. Mt. 5:7 “Blessed are the merciful: for they will be shown mercy.”
3. Grandpa did not often tell us how much he loved us, but we knew he loved us by what he did to show his love. Once he and Grandma took a summer vacation with my family. It was Mom, Dad, Jeff & myself in our car and Grandma & Grandpa in their old blue International Harvester pickup. We were somewhere West of Dalhart, TX and had been on the road the better part of the day, when Dad saw a lone Elm tree with a picnic table on the horizon. Dad quickly took the decision to stop and have a picnic there on the high plains of the Texas panhandle. Both vehicles rolled to a stop and Dad, Jeff and I unloaded from the Buick and ran back to Grandpa’s truck just as the wind shifted. Dad had stopped us next to the biggest pig yard in west Texas. The smell almost overwhelmed Grandpa, who was still behind the wheel of the International Harvester. He never criticized Dad or offered any opinions about Dad’s choice of picnic areas. He simply said, “James, I’m not that hungry. Let’s keep driving.” Grandpa showed his love to us. Compared to our Lord 1Jn 4:9-10 9 God showed how much he loved us by sending his only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through him. 10 This is real love. It is not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins.

   For those of us who don’t yet believe in the LORD and for those of us who do believe, we should consider these words from Jesus in Matthew 19:25-26 & 20:1-16
   25When the disciples heard this, they were greatly astonished and asked, “Who then can be saved?” 26Jesus looked at them and said, “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.”

   Jesus then told this parable about those who follow him.
   1 “For the Kingdom of Heaven is like the owner of an estate who went out early one morning to hire workers for his vineyard. 2 He agreed to pay the normal daily wage and sent them out to work.
   3 “At nine o’clock in the morning he was passing through the marketplace and saw some people standing around doing nothing. 4 So he hired them, telling them he would pay them whatever was right at the end of the day. 5 At noon and again around three o’clock he did the same thing. 6 At five o’clock that evening he was in town again and saw some more people standing around. He asked them, ‘Why haven’t you been working today?’
   7 “They replied, ‘Because no one hired us.’
   “The owner of the estate told them, ‘Then go on out and join the others in my vineyard.’
   8 “That evening he told the foreman to call the workers in and pay them, beginning with the last workers first. 9 When those hired at five o’clock were paid, each received a full day’s wage. 10 When those hired earlier came to get their pay, they assumed they would receive more. But they, too, were paid a day’s wage. 11 When they received their pay, they protested, 12 ‘Those people worked only one hour, and yet you’ve paid them just as much as you paid us who worked all day in the scorching heat.’
   13 “He answered one of them, ‘Friend, I haven’t been unfair! Didn’t you agree to work all day for the usual wage? 14 Take it and go. I wanted to pay this last worker the same as you. 15 Is it against the law for me to do what I want with my money? Should you be angry because I am kind?’
   16 “And so it is, that many who are first now will be last then; and those who are last now will be first then.”
   Some come early in the day, some come in the middle of the day, and some come at the very end of the day, but all receive the very generous reward from their Master.

   Grandpa did indeed confess Jesus about six months ago, while talking with Dad.

   Mt. 12:1-13 God Almighty follows the Spirit of the law not the letter of the law. He is a Lord of mercy. Mt. 12:7 “If you had known what these words mean, ‘I desire mercy not sacrifice,’ you would not have condemned the innocent.”

   To conclude this memorial to Homer Martin, we can know that
   1) He was tough & yet gentle like Jesus
   2) He was just, yet merciful like Jesus
   3) He showed his love by his actions, like Jesus.
   4) And finally he confessed his faith that Jesus is Lord.

Isaiah 65:17 “Look! I am creating new heavens and a new earth—so wonderful that no one will even think about the old ones anymore.”
This is one of those amazing prophecies that many Christians forget about. We tend to get hung up on the passage from 2 Peter 3:10-12 that states; “But the day of the Lord will come as unexpectedly as a thief. Then the heavens will pass away with a terrible noise, and everything in them will disappear in fire, and the earth and everything on it will be exposed to judgment.*Since everything around us is going to melt away, what holy, godly lives you should be living! You should look forward to that day and hurry it along—the day when God will set the heavens on fire and the elements will melt away in the flames.”
For the longest time I would forget or just ignore the simplest part of this passage, verse 13. “But we are looking forward to the new heavens and new earth he has promised, a world where everyone is right with God.”
How could we miss that? Peter tells us that the prophecy from Isaiah 65:17 is still in the future. He also reveals that he, along with his audience were intently looking forward to this New Heaven and New Earth.
I have a passion for gardening. I love the ponds and streams in my garden. The sounds are tranquil. The smells are a clean & soothing. The flowers are majestic in a subtle way.
I am not a particularly good gardener. I am really just a dabbler in the dirt. But, one day God will reveal a New Heaven and a New Earth for his righteous ones, and I pray that the practice I am getting now will come to good and perfect use.

On this same theme Paul, in Romans 8:19-23 said about our fallen earth and our paradise lost, For all creation is waiting eagerly for that future day when God will reveal who his children really are. Against its will, everything on earth was subjected to God’s curse. All creation anticipates the day when it will join God’s children in glorious freedom from death and decay. For we know that all creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. And even we Christians, although we have the Holy Spirit within us as a foretaste of future glory, also groan to be released from pain and suffering. We, too, wait anxiously for that day when God will give us our full rights as his children,* including the new bodies he has promised us.
Its funny that we think that this whole realm of God’s creation would be just written off. I say “we”, because I was never taught about the redemption of Creation. I have an assumption that most have not been taught about the prophecy of a “New Heaven and New Earth”. But, God’s nature is of life, beauty, harmony, peace, and perfection, He’s not one to just destroy.
I think that maybe we misunderstand the language of Peter in that passage above. Maybe Peter was talking about a purification fire. This is not uncommon in the bible. The smelting of metal to remove the impurities or “slag.” Could it be that the melting that Peter reveals is like that.
I hope so. And deep down I think so too.
Just as I must take up my cross daily to follow the Lord, and just as I am buried with Jesus in baptism and am raised up a new creature symbolically, I know that the true resurrection is to come. Paul tells us that the creation is waiting for that day eagerly. I suspect that the creation is not eagerly anticipating being destroyed by fire, but rather maybe it is looking to a day when all the bullets & shrapnel that are laying in the fields of Europe, Asia, Africa, & America will be purged from memory and only flowers will remain.
I hope!

DSM

My point is that Jesus made a clear point of who the Kingdom of God was intended to battle and (FYI) it was never other people. On the contrary, people are always portrayed as the reason for Christ’s giving up Heaven and dying on the cross. People are called captives of the devil, not demons of the devil.
We are not following Jesus when we act as if our fellow man is an enemy.
How did Jesus defeat his human “enemies”? The answer is he did not defeat them. He surrendered to them. He died for them.
Jesus died for me while I was turning my back on God. Jesus did not say ‘David is my enemy, therefore I will, attack him, ignore him, avoid him, or let him go to Hell.’
Disciples of Jesus should not do what our Lord did not do.