Who Is Lying At Your Gate?
St. Luke 16:19-22
The word used here in verse number 20 is laid: this comes from the Greek word ballo. This literally means to throw down or cast down as dung or to thrust down.
There was a certain beggar named Lazarus- His name is mentioned because his character was good, his end was glorious, and because it is the purpose of God that the righteous be had in an everlasting remembrance. Lazarus is a contraction of the word Eliezar, which signifies help or assistance from God – a name properly given to a man who was both poor and afflicted, and had not any source of help save that which came from God alone.
Our question from God to the reader is who is lying at your personal gate. At the place where we as individuals pass every day. Is it my neighbor, family member, friend, co-worker, or the person I do not even know. Is it possible that while I enjoy my life of leisure someone looks through the gates of my heart with eyes filled with longing and heart wrenching desire?
Acts 3:1-10
The same word is used here in this passage; laid. In this setting it comes from a very distinctly different root word. Here it means placed properly, settled, sunk down with comfort, positioned in love. But the longing of this mans heart was no less than that of Lazarus. Though his parents placed him in an area where good people would pass and he could possibly obtain monetary assistance from those entering the temple; his heart still longs for something more than pennies in his purse and coins in his cup.
How many people position themselves in our pathway on purpose? How many does God let us come in contact with entrusting us to do right by them? Oh for someone to compel those who are lamed, broken-hearted, and sin sick to come to the Master and be touched by His hands of love. Not just an angel troubling the water, a rich mans food, two zealous fire filled preacher but rather the I AM, the Christ, Jesus the Son of God.
Psalms 24:7-10 Lift up your heads, O ye gates; and be lift up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of Glory shall come in. Who is the King of glory? The Lord strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O ye gates; even lift them up, ye everlasting doors; and the King of glory shall come in. Who is this King of glory? The Lord of hosts, he is the King of Glory.
Dedicated by President Grover Cleveland in October of 1886. In 1903 Emma Lazarus wrote and poem that is inscribed on a bronze plaque on Mrs. Liberty's base.
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A might woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lighting, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon hand
Glows world wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air- bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
Who Is Lying At Your Gate?
Much more than Lady Liberty beckons the weary and tired; Christ is the embodiment of the Statue of Liberty. He is the door, the Holy Ghost is the fire in the Lamp, and the cry is, “Come!!” Let whosoever will come.
We must endeavor to get those who land near our gate, beached from the awful storms on the sea of life, inside the gate. To that place that without fear or reservation they can know of a certainty that God will be their God. Let us not leave any one lying at the gate; let us purpose and put to action the creed that Jesus wants everyone to come to him!!
