Claudette's Blog

The Good the Bad and the Ugly

Last Monday, my family went and picked out two dozen roses for two individuals, one received a dozen of pink and the other had received a dozen of peach.  A few days later the pink roses had dried up, they honestly looked bad, so I through them away.  The next day we went to visit one of the individuals who had the peach roses, the roses were still beautiful and in full bloom.

The two different roses looked pretty much the same when I purchased them, healthy and pretty. However, I would have not thought that these roses would symbolize a story in scripture, but they did.  

The one set of roses represented the Love of Christ in the heart of a believer one who is not perfect, but believes and serves the Lord, encased within a ray of light.

The other set of roses represented a house divided inside, a heart that is self absorbed, selfish, and one that no one could please, encased within darkness.

Jeremiah 24

After King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon exiled Jehoiachin son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, to Babylon along with the officials of Judah and all the craftsmen and artisans, the Lord gave me this vision. I saw two baskets of figs placed in front of the Lord’s Temple in Jerusalem. ² One basket was filled with fresh, ripe figs, while the other was filled with bad figs that were too rotten to eat.

 ³ Then the Lord said to me, “What do you see, Jeremiah?”

   I replied, “Figs, some very good and some very bad, too rotten to eat.”

 ⁴ Then the Lord gave me this message: ⁵ “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: The good figs represent the exiles I sent from Judah to the land of the Babylonians.⁶ I will watch over and care for them, and I will bring them back here again. I will build them up and not tear them down. I will plant them and not uproot them. ⁷ I will give them hearts that recognize me as the Lord. They will be my people, and I will be their God, for they will return to me wholeheartedly.

 ⁸ “But the bad figs,” the Lord said, “represent King Zedekiah of Judah, his officials, all the people left in Jerusalem, and those who live in Egypt. I will treat them like bad figs, too rotten to eat. ⁹ I will make them an object of horror and a symbol of evil to every nation on earth. They will be disgraced and mocked, taunted and cursed, wherever I scatter them. ¹⁰ And I will send war, famine, and disease until they have vanished from the land of Israel, which I gave to them and their ancestors.”

Who would like to put a dozen dead roses in the middle of a table, or put a pile of rotten figs on a platter to serve?  I leave the question up to you to answer.  

However, I do know that everyday there are people who are serving that to themselves, because there heart is empty from spending too much time filling their heart with things that eventually die and rot.

The heart is the well springs of life, you can decide to make it good, bad or ugly it’s your choice what you want to keep serving yourself, but let me encourage you, and don’t knock what I say until you’ve tried it. Fill yourselves with the Love of Christ, you can do it right where you sitting, serve yourself a portion that will never leave you empty.  His name is Jesus what else do you have to lose you tried everything else and its failed it’s died and it’s rotted you.  Ask Jesus to come into your heart ask him to set you free from the rot that has invaded your life, ask him to help you, and He will. He is closer than a stone’s throw away.

Blessings,

Claudette