One Plants; Sometimes Harvest Not What We Expected

Hear Here: http://bit.ly/2Z3BGj6 1 I'll sing a ballad to the one I love, a love ballad about his vineyard: The one I love had a vineyard, a fine, well-placed vineyard. 2 He hoed the soil and pulled the weeds, and planted the very best vines. He built a lookout, built a winepress, a vineyard to be proud of. He looked for a vintage yield of grapes, but for all his pains he got junk grapes. 3 "Now listen to what I'm telling you, you who live in Jerusalem and Judah. What do you think is going on between me and my vineyard? 4 Can you think of anything I could have done to my vineyard that I didn't do? When I expected good grapes, why did I get bitter grapes? 5 "Well now, let me tell you what I'll do to my vineyard: I'll tear down its fence and let it go to ruin. I'll knock down the gate and let it be trampled. 6 I'll turn it into a patch of weeds, untended, uncared for - thistles and thorns will take over. I'll give orders to the clouds: 'Don't rain on that vineyard, ever!'" 7 Do you get it? The vineyard of God-of-the-Angel-Armies is the country of Israel. All the men and women of Judah are the garden he was so proud of. He looked for a crop of justice and saw them murdering each other. He looked for a harvest of righteousness and heard only the moans of victims. You Who Call Evil Good and Good Evil (Isaiah 5:1-7 The Message)

My apologies for mistyping my last name! Some of you let me know you tried to make a contribution to support ConCafe and got an error message. Here is the correct link: paypal.me/eradiovalverde. Sorry about that! I thank all of you for your prayers for my friend, Mr. Daniel Soliz. I ask for more prayers as the exams found reason for him to see his oncologist. He is very concerned for his family. He has three small children and is worried about them. Danny is also a student at Perkins School of Theology and his dream was to enter into the ministry. Please pray for healing. Pray for one another. Pray for each other.

A joyous and blessed Wednesday for you, dear Friend. My prayers for a Wednesday that when it is all said and done, we will say was wonderful!

This passage is about the reality of life. Early in the first pages of the Bible we see the reality come into the first family. Adam and Eve were blessed with two children, Cain and Abel. I believe they were raised the same way yet the outcome was not what they expected. No caring parent wants their children to suffer and most parents do not want their children to cause suffering. Many are the parents who say, "I want my child(ren) to be happy." Yes, but are you also raising them to be good? One can only imagine the heartache of those first parents to hear that one of their sons killed his only brother. And I wish the murders ended there. And that the rest of the biblical families had wonderful, loving, obedient

The vineyard of parents is their offspring; as it was for God. Try as He did, God still discovered that his children were disobedient and unfaithful to Him. God expected faithfulness and righteousness; God would have provided more. Yet it seems our natural inclination is away from God and towards our own pleasures and desires. We covet what others have, and seek to be just like them; when we have already been blessed with love and goodness from God. Friends, the same may be true with our children from time to time; ours is to be loving and faithful towards them. And our obligation continues to be loving, faithful, and righteous towards God and towards our neighbor.

PRAYER: Loving Father, we ask forgiveness for our times of being the "bitter grapes" in Your vineyard. We ask that we might be made righteous and faithful towards You and Yours. We pray in Christ Jesus' strong name, amen.

Have a great and blessed day in the Lord! Be a sweet grape today!

Blessings of love,

Pastor Eradio Valverde