August 12, 2026
Don Moen has lightened many a burdened heart with his
assuring song of God’s goodness. The lyric states, “By a roadway in the
wilderness, He'll lead me. And rivers in the desert will I see. Heaven and
Earth will fade. But His Word will still remain. He will do something new today”.
From Abraham to Jesus to the priest ministering to a far-flung
Parish, each one set on doing God’s Will is led as the song intones, “He
will be my guide. Hold me closely to His side. With love and strength for each
new day. He will make a way, He will make a way”.
Those possessing large landholdings for residential and
commercial development must plan well in advance to generate sizeable returns
on their investments, including the cost of developing property and its
marketing and sale. The big developers create an ecosystem around them – an information
network – that alerts and informs their decision-making. The system is built to
ensure financial returns on their investment.
Then we have the Catholic Church – with a single North Star
- staying true to a mission given 2000 years ago by the resurrected Christ. He
said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation”
- Mk 16:15. The Catholic Church invests in land decades in advance to build
schools, hospitals, formation centres and churches in often isolated areas with
a priest or pair of religious living on the land battling the elements. It is
mission work. Their dependence is on Him. He will make a way when they face difficulties
which are often legendary.
‘Going into the world’ spawns the notion of a series of
journeys criss-crossing the earth from the North to the South Pole and to every
inhabited and uninhabited surface of the earth. That’s what Jesus’ apostles and
disciples did then, and continue to do today, not for personal gain, but for
the salvation of mankind, at least from the Christian perspective. A mission
that is expected to continue till the last man, woman, and child have heard the
Gospel preached to them.
7 And he called the twelve and began
to send them out two by two, and gave them authority over the unclean spirits. 8 He
charged them to take nothing for their journey except a staff—no bread, no bag,
no money in their belts— 9 but to wear sandals
and not put on two tunics.– Mk 6:7-9
The recorded biblical journeys
begin with Abram: The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your
country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will
show you” – Gen 12:1. The land shown to Abram was the land of the Cannanites.
The boundaries of Canaan covered
the most strategic location on earth, immaculately chosen by the Creator
of the universe for the spread of the Gospel. The Schedule (as in any land
transaction) would show the Mediterranean Sea to the West; the southern end of
the Dead Sea to the East; Mount Hor to Lebo Hamath to the North; and the Desert
of Zin along the border of Edom to the South onto Egypt – connecting Africa,
Europe, and Asia - three known inhabited continents 4000 years back. “‘This
will be your land, with its boundaries on every side.’” Read Numbers 34:1-12;
Ezekiel 47:13-20 for a detailed description.
In 336 BC, Alexander assumed his
father’s throne in Pella, Macedonia and began to conquer the entire Persian
Empire, which included the Northwestern part of India – the Punjab and Sindh - where
he confronted and defeated King Porus at the Battle of Hydaspes (where his army,
fatigued to the core after 11 years of battle, mutinied) - and then down to the
Indus Valley. In 325 BC, part of Alexander’s army made their homeward journey to
Macedonia by sea, while Alexander and the rest of the army marched by land.
A short, speedy, 13-year campaign
changed the Greco-Roman world forever. Alexander did not get back to Macedonia
to sit on his throne, which he had hardly graced after his father’s death. He fell
ill and died in 323 BC, drinking in the palace of Nebuchadnezzar II. He was
just 32 years old, nearly half of which was spent on the battlefield shedding blood.
Alexander Hellenized the conquered
territories. Greek language and Greek culture permeated every aspect of local
population life – making the spread of the Gospel swifter out of Canaan because
of a common language and culture and the roads laid by the Romans, an empire
that lasted for 1400 years – the Greco-Roman world from the 8th
Century of Homeric epic to the collapse of the Empire in 476 AD. And then the
Ottomans arrived. Islam began to dominate, with Christianity in retreat with
the capture of Constantinople (Istanbul, Turkey today) – the nerve centre of Christianity
before the transition to Rome.
God had made a way where there
seemed to be no way.
During his rampaging march from
Macedonia through the Persian Empire, Alexander did not proceed from Tarsus to
Gaugamela (now in Iraq) - a straight line. He took a detour to Egypt, conquering
the land of Canaan, to visit the oracle of the god Amon at Sīwah in the Western
Desert. Alexander Hellenized the Judean population. It is why we have a
Greek Bible translated from Hebrew.
The immensity of God’s creation
can be experienced with the concept of light-years. For most space objects, we
use light-years to describe their distance. A light-year is
the distance light travels in one Earth year. One light-year is about 6
trillion miles (9 trillion km). That is a 6 with 12 zeros behind it! When we
use powerful telescopes to look at distant objects in space, we are actually looking
back in time. How can this be? Light travels at a speed of 186,000 miles
(or 300,000 km) per second. This seems really fast, but objects in space are so
far away that it takes a lot of time for their light to reach us. The farther
an object is, the farther in the past we see it. Our Sun is the closest
star to us. It is about 93 million miles away. So, the Sun's light takes about
8.3 minutes to reach us. This means that we always see the Sun as it was about
8.3 minutes ago. The next closest star to us is about 4.3 light-years away. So,
when we see this star today, we’re actually seeing it as it was 4.3 years ago.
All of the other stars we can see with our eyes are farther, some even
thousands of light-years away.
God can see light-years ahead.
His prophecies through the prophets are made 40 years ahead (Destruction
of the Temple in 70 AD by the Romans, Mt 24:2 prophesied by Jesus) to 1,000
years to their fulfilment (The Crucifixion of Jesus, Ps 22:16). Bethlehem,
the birthplace of the Messiah, Micah 5:2 in 700 BC. The Fall of Babylon (Isaiah
13:19-22, Jeremiah 50:39-40) — written about 150 years before Babylon
fell. The rise of Cyrus 100 years before Cyrus was born (Isaiah
44:28, 45:1). So on and so forth.
For the diligent and watchful,
God’s guidance through the Holy Spirit is ever-present, if you are willing
to look and see, hear and listen. A difficult proposition that needs to be
worked on, for the Word of God says, ‘Indeed, in their case the prophecy of
Isaiah is fulfilled that says: “You will indeed hear but never understand,
and you will indeed see but never perceive.”’ – Mt 13:14
-
Mathew Anthony
