{"id":5812,"date":"2014-09-15T00:05:37","date_gmt":"2014-09-15T07:05:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/?p=5812"},"modified":"2014-09-14T14:26:13","modified_gmt":"2014-09-14T21:26:13","slug":"strings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/2014\/09\/15\/strings\/","title":{"rendered":"Strings"},"content":{"rendered":"

Why do the nations rage,
\nAnd the people plot a vain thing?
\nThe kings of the earth set themselves,
\nAnd the rulers take counsel together,
\nAgainst the LORD and against His Anointed, saying,
\n\u201cLet us break Their bonds in pieces
\nAnd cast away Their cords from us.\u201d
\nHe who sits in the heavens shall laugh;
\nThe LORD shall hold them in derision.
\nThen He shall speak to them in His wrath,
\nAnd distress them in His deep displeasure:
\n\u201cYet I have set My King
\nOn My holy hill of Zion.\u201d (Psalm 2:1-6)<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Those strings that you think are marionette strings\u2014those strings that are making you do stuff that you think you don\u2019t want to do\u2014how do you know they aren\u2019t really the strings of a parachute? It might not be so wise to cut them.<\/p>\n

People wanted to break free from what they perceived to be God\u2019s unreasonable demands. God\u2019s response was derisive laughter. How come? Because God\u2019s demands were not unreasonable, unless they found a parachute strapped to their back, or a seat belt across their lap and shoulders too restraining. The so called constraints were hardly that: they existed for their benefit. They made life better, not worse. They maximized pleasure, rather than restricting it. <\/p>\n

Some people decided to reject God because they thought he stood in the way of human pleasure. Only after they burned themselves out, like the prodigal son, would they come to realize that perhaps the \u201cold man\u201d wasn\u2019t so stupid after all and may have been telling them stuff for their own good, that could have saved them a lot of pain along the way.<\/p>\n

God loves us and wants what is best for us. God is also very smart and knows a lot. But too often we\u2019d rather listen to ourselves, or other people, who know next to nothing. We find it hard to believe that God really loves us and knows what is best\u2014knows even better than we know ourselves.<\/p>\n

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Why do the nations rage, And the people plot a vain thing? The kings of the earth set themselves, And the rulers take counsel together, Against the LORD and against His Anointed, saying, \u201cLet us break Their bonds in pieces … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_s2mail":"yes"},"categories":[18,17,16],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5812"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5812"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5812\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5814,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5812\/revisions\/5814"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5812"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5812"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5812"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}