Author: Tracy Eldridge

This my witness for my Lord and Savior on the web. I pray that you find these posts useful in your search for Jesus. http://thelivingmessage.com

Grief is hard…


When a friend dies, it hurts. When a brother or sister dies, it hurts more and much deeper. When a parent dies, whether it is your mother or your father, the pain is deep and it stays with you for years. It is not something that you can “get over” or move on from. The pain gets a bit easier to think about over time but it does take time. Sometimes it takes a lot of time.

A person who is or has been a mentor and a friend is close enough to be family, that is who left us today. Why do I say this? Because this person worked with my grandfather and he is in heaven with Jesus today. They are remembering so many memories about their children and grandchildren. They are both worshipping Jesus and thanking Him for saving them from their mistakes and their own stupidity. Something that we all should do today.

I pray that those who read this will think about their families and their own salvation and if they aren’t saved through Jesus Christ then seek Him out while you have the chance. This life is the time for becoming a child of God through Jesus Christ so do it while you can. Don’t wait because not one of us is guaranteed tomorrow. I could die from a cardiac arrest tonight or you could die in a car accident tomorrow morning. Please don’t wait.


Believe in Jesus


Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.
John 14:1 KJV
https://bible.com/verse-of-the-day/jhn.14.1/2428

God’s sacrifice


God first asked Abraham to sacrifice his only son to prove his obedience to Him. Abraham went with his son, Isaac, to the mountain and built an altar and laid the wood on it and bound his son. He even drew the knife and was about to kill his son because God had asked him to. Then God said through an angel, “Abraham, do not harm your son!”. Why did God ask this of Abraham? To test him for sure and see if he would hold nothing back from God if God asked for it and he passed the test. So God gave a ram in place of his son, which was caught in the bushes, so that he and Isaac could worship God and then come home again. Abraham had told his servants when they set out toward the mountain that they would go and worship and then they would come again.

Abraham had faith that since God had promised that through Isaac his descendants would be inumerable, even if he sacrificed Isaac on the altar God would raise him again so that His promise would be fulfilled. In the same way, many thousands of years later, God gave His only Son up as a sacrifice for all of our sins and then raised Him up on the third day to be our Savior and Lord. I know you are probably thinking that since Jesus was God’s Son He couldn’t die anyway. But you’d be wrong. Jesus was born just as much a human being as you or I.

He got tired. He was tempted in every way like we are. He was afraid of the torture and the pain that He would experience during the crucifixion and the scourging which lead up to it. Just as any of us would be. He was so stressed about it until He was sweating drops of blood prior to His arrest. Doctors today have confirmed that it is possible to do this in highly stressful times.

Jesus came into the world for this purpose and yet He gave His life for you and me and many others just so we could be a part of His family! Isn’t that a wonderful gift? I know there are many who think that being a Christian takes all of the fun out of life but it doesn’t. You just have fun telling others about your Savior and what He has done for you. Should we forget all of our old stomping grounds and friends? No, but we should tell them about Jesus and His influence on our life. You can’t beat them over the head with a Bible but you can tell them how your life has changed after He came in and freed you from your slavery to sin.

I know that many of you will say, “I’m not a slave to sin!”. Well, how many times have you read the Bible lately? Can you tell me what all ten commandments are? Are you still drinking and smoking even after you’ve been redeemed by His blood? If you can’t answer any of these questions with the answer of “Yes!” or “No, I don’t drink and smoke anymore.” Then what kind of change really happened when you were “saved”? If you aren’t at least trying to change your life and your lifestyle so that you can walk with Jesus on a daily walk like His disciples did, then you may not be saved at all.

Seek Him out today and learn more about His offer of salvation by reading John’s gospel and then read Romans. Don’t stop searching for your Savior because He came here for you!

God works in us to do His will!


For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.
Philippians 2:13 KJV
https://bible.com/verse-of-the-day/php.2.13/10585

Are you listening?


God does speak to us today, but many people don’t know how to truly listen to Him. They ask, “How can I hear God speak to me?”. Well, if you would read the Bible, God’s Word, you would hear Him speaking in every verse of it. Sometimes He gives encouragement and sometimes He is rebuking you by His Word but He is speaking to you and to each of us. Sometimes we will search God’s Word until we find something that we like and we will say that God agrees with our position on whatever it is but that is not seeking His will for you that you trying to justify something that you know is wrong!

The funny thing is that God will let you get away with your justification until you realize that you truly made a mistake because it isn’t working out the way you hoped it would. Things are getting worse rather than getting better. You need to pick up God’s Word and seek His will for your life by prayerful meditation and reading with prayer so that you truly are hearing from Him and not your own “conscience” voice. You know your mind-voice can sound like your idea of God’s voice. You can convince yourself that you are hearing from God and all you are doing is talking to yourself. You can get pretty good at it too until one day when all of the “things” which your god told you to do come crashing down on your head and you realize, hopefully, that those were not God’s words of direction but your own.

How can you tell the difference? Because if you truly were hearing God’s voice and following His direction those “things” wouldn’t have crumbled to dust around you. If you truly were listening and following His directions like you thought you were…things would work out the way He intended for them to. It is a novel concept and it is shown in the Bible very clearly. When a prophet or king follows God and does the things which God tells him to do, the way He tells him to do it, everything works out wonderfully. But, when you try to inject your ideas or change things so that people will like you rather than following God’s directions there are consequences which follow and most of the time they aren’t fun at all.

Most of our lives are like that as well. When we are truly following God’s direction in our lives and not trying to do things our way all the time everything works out most of the time. I say most of the time because none of us follow His directions perfectly, but if we are listening to Him we try our best to follow Him. God expects us to follow Him and His directions when we are His and we have given our life to Him but if you don’t know Him or if you are being stubborn and ignoring His direction or His calling in your life then your ideas and your pathway will not be so easy nor will they work out the way you had hoped.

Seek His guidance and His direction by following Him and giving your life to Him because He paid for your sins on the cross. Is being a Christian easy? No, it is not because there are going to be temptations and situations where you want to do things your way or even go back to doing things like you did before you asked Jesus for His Presence in your life. I pray that anyone who feels His call on your life through reading this or even by a dream or hearing God’s Word preached will answer and ask Him to come into your life and change you into the person that He knows you can be.

Apart from Christ we are nothing


I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.
John 15:5 KJV
https://bible.com/bible/1/jhn.15.5.KJV

My part doesn’t count


Don’t ever think this thought! I have thought it at times but your part does count! God can use your life, your voice, your message, your witness in ways that you have no idea just how much good it may do. But He does!

He knows how many people will hear or listen to or even read your words, like on this blog, and He will use your voice to take His message to the world and those who are desperate to hear the gospel of Jesus and His love for them. Just as when it is time to vote for a President or a Senator, your vote…your voice does count! If John had not gone to Ephesus and preached to them they wouldn’t have heard about Jesus. If Paul had not gone to all of the places that he went to with the good news of Jesus and the salvation through Him then many people would never have heard about Jesus.

Each of us has a part to play in the grand scheme of life, whether we believe in Jesus as our Savior or not. Our part is not usually a small part because we do influence people around us whether we realize it or not. It is that influence which carries His message to the world most of the time. A thank you to a stranger or blessing the food at a restaurant or just opening the door for someone who may have their hands full or maybe you are just doing it “just because”. Any of these small interactions can have a big impact on people and then their impact on others will be affected too.

None of us can truthfully claim that what we do in this life makes no difference. Adam and Eve ate a fruit that they weren’t supposed to eat. It doesn’t sound like much until you realize that God had told them not to before they did it. They disobeyed God’s command and did their own thing, which is what we’ve been doing ever since. It was a small decision but it had huge consequences for the rest of creation. Don’t ever discount a decision that you are thinking about. Whether you think it is big or not, seek out God’s perspective on it if you are a believer because His advice is always right. Though many of us today are too impatient to wait for His answer at times.

Does your influence count? Yes it does. A parent has a lot of influence over a child’s growth and their ideas about life as they grow older. We may not think that they are listening but they are and they hear more than you think they do. A teacher or a coach has a lot of influence in the lives of those that they come in contact with over the course of their careers. Sometimes they may not find it out until years later. Society and social media today have a lot of influence on people of all ages, as well as the smart phones which we all seem to have attached to our hands.

God loves each of us and He does care about your life and your eternity. All that you need to do is believe in Him and give your life to Him so that He can give His Life to you.

I will remember…


A day of remembrance


This day is a day of remembrance for those who have lost loved ones in wartime conflicts. We strive in our Christian lives against the powers of the world and the Satanic powers and demons and we should be careful in our walk with Jesus because of the influence against us. While it is true that in America we are not killed for our faith, we are still persecuted for it if we show it openly. But…isn’t that what Jesus told us to do? Jesus said to “go and tell the world the good news of salvation“.

We should remember those who have gone into the world and told of His good news because many of those were martyred for their witness and their faith. They are casualties in the war between the Light of Jesus and the Darkness of the world. God offers each of us the chance for salvation through belief in Jesus as our Savior but how will others know of Him if we don’t tell them? Do not forget the sacrifice of those who died for our freedoms but also don’t forget those who have died for the cause and the message of Jesus Christ our Lord as well.

Amen!

The beginning of Wisdom


The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom: and the knowledge of the holy is understanding.
Proverbs 9:10 KJV
https://bible.com/bible/1/pro.9.10.KJV