For your interest April, 2016 is the 400th year anniversary since the death of William Shakespeare.
His genius as a playwright and a bard (poet as they were then called) is undisputed. Doubtless the greatest the world has ever seen. His range of subject covered the whole spectrum of human experience. The historical and the romantic; the tragic and the comedic; military conquest and ignominious defeat, philosophy and farce.
One phrase probably sums up the range of his thought.
"All the world's a stage. All the men and women are but players."
There are hundreds of quotable quotes but let me pass on to you some of Shakespeare's musings upon God.
"God has given you a face and you make yourself another."
"Let never day nor night unhallowed pass but still remember what the Lord hath done."
"Ignorance is a curse of God. Knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to heaven."
"A politician... one who would circumvent (get around) God."
"Tis mad idolatry to make thy service greater than thy God."
"However wickedness outstrips men, it has no wings to fly from God."
"God is our fortress in whose conquering name we resolve to scale their flinty bulwarks."
"But thou proud man, dressed in brief authority and ignorant of what thou are most assured, playeth such fantastic tricks under Heaven as maketh angels weep."
And upon that line I do take a bow and make mine exit!
Jubilate.
Ian
It seems hard to believe that the Chernobyl disaster happened 30 years ago.
On April 26th,1986, news began to break forth that things had gone wrong in the Ukraine.
Things often went wrong in the old Soviet Empire but most of the time we never heard about them happening because they were covered up. News of this crisis could not be suppressed.
There had been a melt down of the core of the nuclear power station at Chernobyl, in the Ukraine, and a vast cloud of radio active gas was beginning to drift across the earth.
And drift it did, steered by high level winds it eventually circled the globe dripping its deadly cargo in showers of poisonous rain wherever it went.
This event was only a precursor of what the Book of Revelation speaks about, when it tells of the vials of God's wrath being poured out upon the earth. I recommend that you read the passage yourselves from Chapter 16.
If you cannot fully understand the symbolism of these vials of God's anger be sure of the central point: it was not a good time to be alive upon the earth. The whole chapter reads like a Hollywood horror script.
So much for the bad news.
The good news that precedes this catastrophe is VERY good.
Namely the removal of Christ's people from the planet by an event called the "Rapture of the Church."
You can read about this as described by Paul in the 4th chapter of his Thessalonian epistle.
You can be part of this glorious moment by placing your full trust in the Lord Jesus Christ right now.
The alternative is to build a nuclear fall-out shelter and begin to stock it with canned soup and bottled water.
I recommend the former. It is a lot cheaper and a lot safer.
Jubilate.
Ian
