Snapshots and Synapses

What do you think about when you consider Palm Sunday? Is it Jesus’ triumphal entry into Jerusalem, or is it the knowledge that many of these same people cheering for Him would be calling out for His crucifixion? Do you question how you would have responded to Him? Do you wonder how Jesus felt, knowing that He was entering the city to endure a legal, physical and spiritual trial, that these people who cheered for Him would also reject Him?  I don’t have much to write other than this: I am not worthy. None of us are. I struggle to let go of life’s conveniences, but Jesus willingly gave His very life for fickle people like us. Was it the Romans that crucified Jesus? Was the Jews? Was it God the Father? It was each of us, who by each sin, both little and great, created a need for a perfect sacrifice. So out of love, God sent His Son, and out of love the Son endured the scourging and death that each of us deserves. If no one accepted this great gift, if it were just you or I that would...

I'm not sure where to begin with this. After all, people historically have gone over the top with their revelations on the Book of Revelation. And let's be clear: John, the author, told us specifically not to add or remove anything from the book. So I will do my best to explain my understanding without any presumptions that my understanding is correct. This is simply my humble conjecture; it is not gospel truth. We see but dimly and even the brightest of all men (someone smarter than myself) can only understand scripture as God chooses to reveal it. I have written before that with every prophecy there is a revelation, an interpretation, and finally an application . The Book of Revelation is filled with revelation upon revelation. The Book of Revelation includes many interpretations as well as references to other symbols found earlier in the Bible. There are many educated theologians with vastly different understandings of this book... because it is prophetic! And as such prophe...

Thirty-five years ago this month, I was commissioned as a naval officer and reported to my first duty station in Pensacola, FL, and today my oldest son reports for active duty as a 2nd Lieutenant in the U.S. Army. My heart swells with pride in his decision to serve, knowing that these are indeed uncertain times. The world has changed dramatically over the past year, and I have no doubt that we will see changes over this next year like no other time in history.  If I could go back to my younger self, there's so much I would try to teach him, things that I have tried to pass on to my children, some of which they've internalized and some things that cause smiles, jokes and eye rolls. I'm glad to have the transparency with my kids and glad to have them challenge my thoughts as they form their own. Even if they disagree on certain things, they know my beliefs and even how to finish my dad-isms that I've learned and repeated through the years: A smart man learns from his mist...

The need for a national day of prayer has never been greater than today. This country has forgotten its foundation as a Christian nation and fallen into division. The enemies of this nation have embedded themselves in the power structures of government, education, media, big tech, and big business. A great economic reset is being planned for the world. And I wouldn’t be surprised if Pandemic 2.0 comes along because fearful people are easily controlled.  But our God is in control and nothing happens that He does not allow. He tells us to draw close to Him, and He will draw close to us. He promises to work everything for good. He reminds us that while this world is not our home, to live in the present as ambassadors of His Kingdom with an eye on our eternal home, as salt and light in this world. And in Psalm 37, He tells us to surrender to His will, waiting patiently, without being preoccupied by the apparent success of evil doers.  Finally, we lean upon Him and His grace to do ...

Who is called by His Name? Christians receive their name from Christ and we are anointed with His Name. Y’srael (Israel) was the name God gave to Jacob and it has been the name of God’s people since before Jesus’ birth. Yahweh gave Jacob (meaning “deceiver”) a new name that means “struggles with Yahweh”, and that is the story of God’s people ever since. Like Israel, we struggle with our own rebellion against God and His ways. We struggle against our SELF as we learn to love, learning that love is a decision to give rather than lust which vainly seeks to feed the SELF. Yet how many of our prayers reflect our lust rather than our love? Our typical prayer is for SELF: deliverance from our circumstances, provision, protection. Yes, we should always turn to God as our Provider and Protector, yet we often we look to other constructs like employers or governments as our provider or protector in place of God. When we put our faith in these things, it is idolatry. Perhaps they aren’t made of wo...

Continued from The 70th Week and 2021  - Part 1  As Jesus explained the End Times to His disciples in Matthew 24, He referenced chapter 9 of the prophet Daniel. Looking to that book, we find Daniel in a prayer forgiveness for his people, basing his petition upon God’s name and not anything that Israel deserved. Israel had sinned and was deserving of God’s judgement, and the historical tendency of Israel to turn away from God and His ways burdened Daniel just as our own tendency toward selfishness should bother us. In today’s environment, we would do well to imitate Daniel’s prayer for Israel  and apply it to the Church and to our country. Take a look at Daniel 9:3-20 and consider how to imitate Daniel’s example in prayer and supplication.  So Daniel prayed, and as he did, he was visited a second time by the angel Gabriel ( v21 ), who told him: 24 “Seventy sets of seven time periods have been assigned for your people and your holy city. These time periods will serve t...

This week, I felt like it would be better to revisit  this blog post . It’s really important to remind God’s people that it really is all about you. See my  10 year old warning  and join me in confession and a change in lifestyle so that we   Return  to God like never before because  something  is happening in this nation... and God's people are the reason! copyright ©2020 Mitchell Malloy ( http://mitchellmalloyblogspot.com/ ) 

I’m a fan of the Lord of the Rings, both the books and the movies, and while I believe some people can over-spiritualize Tolkien’s masterpiece, so much of this story resonates with me. For example: the Steward of Gondor is a regent from a line of regents whose role is to administer the country of Gondor until the rightful king returns. His title of “Steward” says it all; the country doesn’t belong to him, but the responsibility is clearly his. The role of a regent is bearing that responsibility and doing all that they can to see the rightful monarch ascend to the throne to ultimately support the king.  But power is a hard thing to relinquish, and transitions are seldom easy. In the movie Return of the King, the Steward of Gondor had come to see himself as the rightful ruler and his progeny as the rightful successors to the throne. When the King of Gondor finally returned during the nation’s greatest peril, the Steward was less than helpful.  Today is Shabbat Shuvah, the sabbat...

Imagine this:  You are at a large house party complete with delicious food and drinks. Music is playing and people are talking, laughing, and smiling. You are there with family, friends, neighbors, some co-workers and even some folks you don’t recognize when you notice a beeping from the middle of the house. You walk over to the take a closer look at the source of the noise: a small electronic device. Hoping it’s not what you think it is, you examine it more closely and your fears are confirmed when you realize it’s a bomb! Somehow in a wacky way you don’t fully understand, you have the knowledge and expertise to know for sure that this is a lethal bomb that has been activated. It will blow up the house, leaving only a large crater. You don’t even know how you recognize the bomb, but you do. You also realize it could simply look like a bomb, a clever fake intended to make a joke of the person recognizing it. And yet you know it really is a bomb.  The beeping continues as you ...

The emperor has no clothes!  There’s a story I learned in my youth about an emperor who was deceived into buying a robe made of silk so fine that it was imperceptible. In truth, it was nothing, a mere fabrication of real fabric. Yet, believing himself to be wearing a fine and magnificent robe, he paraded down the street until a child remarked: “The emperor has no clothes!” Hearing the utterance the emperor ran back in humiliation.  I can imagine if this happened in our day and age how the TV pundits would quickly have a spin on the story. And of course, social media would have flurry of opinions over the issue: “The emperor was disgraced by an unruly child!”; “The emperor lost his mind!”; “The parents should be imprisoned!” Meanwhile, many would lose sight of the fact that it took a child to speak the truth that everyone else was too afraid to say.  “Be nice!”  Someone might have told that child to be nice. We tell our kids to “be nice” as if...

To say the least, it was unusual for a Destroyer to be the flag ship of an admiral, but this was such a small group of ships that the Commodore chose the USS William V. Pratt. It was the ship I served on as a junior officer, and I was fortunate for the experience. I was a new Christian, and one night I found myself in a theological debate with the Commodore over the question: Is man basically good? The flag officer insisted that man was inherently wicked, but I held onto the belief that man was basically good. From my perspective, the cause of bad behavior was that people were hurt by life’s experiences which created a cycle of pain, but I contended that if a person was treated well and educated, they would grow beyond their experience and learn to respond in a better, healthier way. The prevailing thought in 2020 American society holds the view I boldly debated with the Commodore. In that conversation so many years ago, neither one of us were able to sway the other person, yet I ackno...

I am thankful for our God: Who never abandons us, Who is always patient with us, Who is faithfully working in us to become the people He has called us to be. He reveals truth to His people and steadfastly brings it to fruition. We are impatient, expecting an immediate answer to our prayers, which He sometimes does but more often makes us wait.  Why does God make us wait? I honestly don’t know. It could be because He knows that once we get a quick answer or a quick deliverance, we don’t appreciate it as much. Maybe it’s because He wants us to develop a habit, a lifestyle, of drawing close to Him. Maybe He likes to build the suspense to develop our character and help us to trust Him as He catches us… just in time… each and every time.  Last weekend I suggested we pray. Last year I suggested we pray. 13 years ago I wrote an urgent message . 30 years ago, I said a prayer that changed everything for me. God has been patient and faithful, and He will do as He said He wo...

I’m going to suggest something, and if it makes sense to you, reach out to other believers and suggest the same, maybe posting a link to this blog on social media. I suggest that on Good Friday 10-APR-2020 everyone pray for one hour starting at noon local time wherever you may happen to be in the world. Pray for COVID-19 to disappear forever and for people around the world to recover from this blight. We can blanket our world in prayer for 24 hours as the noon day sun washes over our planet. I don’t know how God will answer our prayers, but He has done miraculous things in the past when His people prayed for deliverance.  Take for example the North American Rocky Mountain Locust. In 1875, the largest locust swarm in history was recorded over the United States Midwest — 198,000 square miles. Compare that to the 163,696 square miles that make up present day California, or for people more familiar with the U.S. Northeast, the locust swarm covered the combined area of Connecticu...

Simple does not equal easy. I wrote last week that if we want to see healing in our land, then God’s people are called to four simple things: Humble ourselves Pray Seek God’s Face Turn from our wicked ways Simple, right? Easy? Not so much.  Humility Each of us tends to have an unrealistic view of ourselves. In pride, we compare ourselves to others, patting ourselves on the back when feeling elevated and shamed when we don’t measure up. But a realistic view, a humble view, of ourselves acknowledges that we don’t measure up to the high standards of God’s righteousness. In humility, we remain grateful for His never-ending grace poured out in ever-lasting love. We are who we are, and by His grace we stumble less over time because we are changed in His Presence. It’s not because of our efforts, but because He gives us the strength to do what He has called us to do.  Prayer It is in that humility that we turn to God in prayer. It sometimes feels li...

How badly do you want to see this COVID-19 coranavirus go away? Last week I wrote about how we reap what we sow . So what have we been sowing? Not just over the past month or past year. What have we been sowing over the past several decades?  For some people, that seems like a long time, and there is so much that has changed over the past 30 years that I could almost agree. Last month, I celebrated an anniversary with my wife, traveling Orlando, FL for a long, wonderful weekend. We lived in Orlando 20 years ago, and it was amazing to see how much had changed. We drove to the Christian School where I had worked as well as the church the school was affiliated with. We found the apartment building where we lived when our first son was born, and the Backyard Burger that we frequented as a special treat with our oldest daughter. So much had changed: the streets, the buildings, the fields. What was once new construction had become weathered and was being replaced by the next genera...

You will reap what you sow. At least that’s what Galatians 6:7  says, and I have no doubt that it’s true. The media has been sowing panic about the Wuhan coronavirus, and we are seeing empty store shelves as people have panicked and stockpiled. And looking at this website , I’m reminded that people will be filled with the fruit of their schemes and ensnared by their wickedness. (Proverbs 1:31, 5:22) Isn’t that what’s happening in our world right now?  President Franklin D. Roosevelt encouraged a Depression-afflicted America that  “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself” , an affliction that is paralyzing the world right now and possibly leading to the same economic condition that Roosevelt was trying to address in his first inaugural speech. The scariest thing about the COVID-19 coronavirus is what we don’t know, which is a terrifying concept for a people that have come to depend on their technology and understanding. We have deified man, and we have worship...

News sources traditionally focus on sensational topics because it draws people’s attention: war, pandemics, gun violence, elections, etc. This is true for both conservative and liberal news media. And it works. If you’re like me, you’ve been reading about the latest sensation: the new coronavirus that was first observed in China that has spread to every continent except Antarctica. We are constantly reminded that there’s so much we don’t know about this new coronavirus but that it has the potential to kill large numbers of people. Yes, we should take precautions and be more attentive to healthy behaviors: wash our hands often, refrain from touching our faces, disinfect doorknobs and counter tops, etc. I don’t want to see anyone die from this or any disease, but I don’t mean to be insensitive when I say I’m not overly concerned. It never helps to panic, and even if someone gets sick, there’s better than a 96% chance of full recovery. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t take preca...

How do you pray, and by that question, what I'm asking is really: "How are you praying on a regular basis?" Jesus gave us five things that we should pray on a regular basis. He lists these in Luke 11:2-4 in what we call the Lord's Prayer: Father, let Your Name be kept holy.  Let Your kingdom come.  Give us our bread day by day. Forgive us as we forgive everyone else.  Don't allow us to be tempted. ONE What does it mean to keep the Name of God the Father holy? It means we set it apart from all other names. It's in a class of it's own, and by our lives we should be glorifying it as the Name above all other Names. We honor the Father, when we praise the Son, glorifying Jesus' Name, which in Hebrew means: "Yahweh Saves!" And yet when we pray that God's Name be kept holy, we are praying for the culture around us to keep His Name holy, set apart.  TWO We pray for His Kingdom to come, a prayer for Jesus' triumpha...