Lying down in green pastures

Ezekiel 34: [14] I will feed them in a good pasture, and upon the high mountains of Israel shall their fold be: there shall they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed upon the mountains of Israel.

[15] I will feed my flock, and I will cause them to lie down, saith the Lord GOD.

"Now, the one who's going to feed them is the good shepherd, the Lord Jesus. You know Psalm 23:

[1] The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.
[2] He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.
[3] He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.

[4] Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. 

"That's not a psalm designed to be quoted at funerals, although the application can be comforting if you make application that way," explains Richard Jordan.

"It's about what's going on in Ezekiel 34. I told you last week, when He said, 'I'll cause them to lie down,' it's, 'I'm going to feed them, and after I feed them they're going to lay down.' What do you do after you've had a big BBQ? You go lay in the sun.

"If you get a big meal, you're satisfied; you're full. You want to go lay down and rest and digest it.

"In Mark 7, when Jesus addresses the Syrophenician woman, He says, 'Let the children first be filled.'

"Mark 7 is a verse that's almost always misquoted. When the woman comes to Christ and wants Him to heal her daughter and He says, 'I'm not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel,' she responds to Him.

[27] But Jesus said unto her, Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the children's bread, and to cast it unto the dogs.

"Let the children first be what? Not fed; filled. That's an important thing. You're not just preaching it to Israel so that Israel gets it; you're preaching it to them so they're FILLED with it.

"That verse is often quoted that the children must first be FED but it doesn't say that. It's says be filled. In other words, Israel must be redeemed. Be filled, restored. That's what He's talking about."

Here is an old post and I will have a new article tomorrow:

 "Life is like a balloon. If you never let yourself go, you’ll never know how far you can rise.”

“If you take a balloon and blow it up, you fill it with air; you inflate it by blowing into it. What you’re doing is making it larger.

"When you are ‘strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,' He’s coming in," explains Richard Jordan. "You’re able to comprehend what God’s doing. You come to a deepening, expanded capacity to appreciate who God really is.

“Now the idea of 'being filled' in the Bible is the idea of being controlled by something. When something FILLS you . . . it has to do with, when you fill something up, you take it over completely.

“Acts 2:1-2 says, [1] And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.
[2] And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting.

“It says when that sound FILLED all the house, in other words, it was in every heart in the house. There’s none of the house that it didn’t occupy. When you fill something, it’s complete in every way. It’s there all over.

“Acts 5:28 says, [28] Saying, Did not we straitly command you that ye should not teach in this name? and, behold, ye have filled Jerusalem with your doctrine, and intend to bring this man's blood upon us.

“You can fill a room with sound; you can fill a city with doctrine! What does that mean? Everywhere in the whole city people got this! So you can fill inanimate things and it’s the idea of, ‘It’s completely everywhere.’

“But when it’s used about people, it isn’t just that it occupies everything in you; it means that it takes over and controls everything about you. It begins to dominate your life."