Not much more to say, other than “Amen!”
I want to share this with you. Enjoy it.
The question above is the very question which a character in a popular TV show could not understand at one point in his life. Yet, it wasn’t long before he realized that it is our feelings…our emotions which guide us. They also help us to make sense of our intellect or life in general. If you are a Trekkie, you know that this was part of a test for Mr. Spock. His mother told him that “the computer knows that you are half human, so it is a logical question”. Many of us flawed, emotional humans tend to have problems dealing with this as well. Maybe not everyday, but at times we do run into situations where our feelings, good or bad, get the best of us. How do you respond in those situations? It depends upon your outlook and whether you depend upon yourself and nobody else or if…
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This is what we think of our lives mostly…that we own it, that it belongs to us and we can do whatever we want with it. If you are not a Christian and you don’t believe in God nor have you given your life to Jesus and asked Him into your heart, then maybe you do own your life. Unless your parents do or your wife or your boss at work does. They do have a certain amount of “ownership” of your time and your life, up to a point. Our life, as we live it, is ours to do with as we please…until we realize that we need Jesus in our life and in our heart. Then we are His.
Why do I say it this way? Because He purchased us with His blood, His death and His resurrection! He paid all of our debts in regards to sin and we are His creation because He knew us before we were ever born into this world! Our purpose in this life, our REAL purpose is to serve Him in whatever way we can. Whether it is as a missionary or a teacher or a preacher or an evangelist. Our work for His Kingdom is to tell others about the gospel, the Good News of His gift of salvation! You cannot earn this gift nor buy it with any amount of work that you claim to do for Him, particularly if the work is done without Him in your life and heart.
Everything that is done prior to repentance from your sinful life and asking Him to cleanse you and make you a new creature if Him has the same value as garbage. In other words…it is worth NOTHING in relation to eternity! Life in eternity is only granted by belief in, and living your days with, Jesus. Remember the story about the thief on the cross? He didn’t have a chance to be baptized and receive the Holy Spirit nor did he have a chance to witness to many people, he only asked Jesus to remember him when He came into His Kingdom. Jesus said to him, “Today, you will be with Me in Paradise.” Because of his belief in Who Jesus was and is, his faith and belief in Jesus saved him from an eternity of punishment. He recognized the Messiah when very few did at that point.
Truly, because of God’s grace toward us, we belong to Him whether we have accepted His grace and mercy through Jesus or not. The unpardonable sin is that we go through life, having heard sermons or read the Bible and know the way of salvation and yet refuse it, sometimes you or someone you know has felt the pull or the voice of the Holy Spirit and just walked away. That is the unpardonable sin which will not be forgiven, especially if you die without ever repenting and turning to Jesus! Think about this, seek Him in His Word, listen for the Spirit speaking to your heart, pray about it and ask Jesus to come into your life and change you. Then live your life as a testimony to Him and about Him until you are called to Heaven by death or by the Angels. Just don’t wait like Satan wants you to, because his lie is that you have plenty of time yet your time may be up tonight or tomorrow!
But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out. And having food and raiment let us be therewith content. But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition. For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows. But thou, O man of God, flee these things; and follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness. Fight the good fight of faith, lay hold on eternal life, whereunto thou art also called, and hast professed a good profession before many witnesses. I give thee charge in the sight of God, who quickeneth all things, and before Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession; That thou keep this commandment without spot, unrebukeable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ:
1 Timothy 6:6-14 KJV
http://bible.com/1/1ti.6.6-14.KJV
Great post! Wish I had written it. I pray that you all enjoy this message.
There are times when God is silent, and we don’t feel Him near to us. We pray desperately to hear His voice in time of need, and we hear nothing. This does not mean that God does not love us or that we are distant from God. It just means we are in a season that we need to crave God more. We need to soak in His presence and read the Bible more diligently. We need to pour ourselves into who God is.
We can all relate to Psalm 4:1 when the author cries out, “answer me when I call to You, my Righteous God. Give me relief from my distress; have mercy on me and hear my prayer.” Isaiah 59:1 confirms that God listens our prayers and rescues us. It says, “surely the arm of the Lord is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear.” God…
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The world and everything in it is changing. The problems which we have to deal with, the good and the bad things which happen every day rarely give any of us a break in our lives. How can we handle so much change from day-to-day? With prayer and seeking God it is possible but there are many people in the world who either refuse to do that or they just don’t believe in God in the first place. Have you ever noticed the stars or the pictures taken by the Hubble telescope? Our universe is not an accident! The stars and their galaxies were placed by God in their orbits and in their places so that we could wonder at His power and majesty.
This world that we live on was put here specifically for our benefit with just the right amount of oxygen and nitrogen to sustain life. This didn’t happen by accident either. The placement of the outer planets and the comets were planned and placed for God’s majesty and for our wonderment. Why? Because we cannot explain these things away with mathematics and calculus. Philosophy and mankind’s intellect can’t explain these collections of stars and gases nor can it explain our own chemical make-up. No amount of education can explain the chemical signals which produce emotions like love or hate or rage and we never will!
They are out of our grasp but one day we will know as we are known by Him. How do I know that? Because it is in His Word! God said so and the world and everything except us was formed by His Word. He specifically came to the garden and formed man from the ground, with His Hands not by His Word, that is why we are fearfully and wonderfully made!!
One of the most worrisome beliefs that I hear about and read about today is that there are many (only 2 to 5% of the population) who either don’t believe in God, are not associated with any religion or who just choose not to associate with an organized religion. That is fine and you are entitled to your opinion, but don’t expect me or any other believer to stop believing in Jesus and the Bible just because you don’t! As I have stated many times before, disbelief or not believing in something or Someone doesn’t get rid of them!
Yes, our culture has changed drastically in many ways over the past fifty or sixty years, but God is still real and so is Satan. Two opposing sides trying to either save mankind or drag as many into hell as possible, the choice is ours. We are not automatically damned to hell, unless that is our choice, and we don’t get a free pass into heaven either. Many do believe that if a child dies before they are old enough to make a rational and conscious choice then they do get to make that choice in the presence of God. Whether that is true or not, I don’t know because it isn’t revealed in the Bible.
Change is coming soon, though I am not sure of the severity or magnitude of that change but it is coming.
Sooner or later we all have to go through one of the first two and everyone will be in an eternity of their own making one day. So, which one will you choose?
Life begins at conception but our life truly begins after we are each born into the world. Our parents have to take care of us for a few years of course, until we get smarter than them at puberty and then they are relegated to our description of “old people”. After each of us graduates from either high school or college, we forget about our parents for a while until we become parents. Then, all of the advice and the “old sayings” come back to us and ring true, so true in fact that we wonder how did our parents get so smart?
Amazing how life works like that isn’t it? Later as all of us age, regardless of whether we want to or not, we notice aches and pains that weren’t there a few years ago. Then, some of the other advice that we heard from “old people” comes to mind when we think about our joints and how it aches to sit for a long time and then get up feeling stiff. We find out we just can’t do stuff like we did when we were younger. That’s why grandma couldn’t run and play with us when we were kids. We thought we would be able to go on hunting trips and travel when we got older and then we find out why our parents didn’t go far from home.
When our parents or our in-laws get older than us and death comes calling on someone close to you, each of us finds out what grief feels like. So, how do we handle it? For some people who may not know Jesus as Lord, this time can be a really hard time. Many people assume that everyone goes to heaven and that is not Biblical. If your loved one has accepted Jesus as their Savior, then that is where they will be, but if they never did or if you’re not sure then you should pray that the rest of your family will give their life and their heart to Jesus.
I am not saying this to make people scared about a loved one that they aren’t sure of, but to open your eyes to the reality that everyone does NOT go to Heaven! Yes, you do stand before God but there are two outcomes which are always present there. One, when Jesus stands with you and says “This one belongs to me, their sins are covered by my blood”, the other is when you are alone and you are asked “What did you do with the light that you were given?”. You are shown all of the times that you heard a sermon or a teaching in Sunday school or at a crusade or on TV and you rejected the call of the Holy Spirit. Maybe you thought that you had plenty of time or maybe you would get around to it next week or next year.
At this point, your eternity is ahead of you. Regardless of the place you will spend it, if you are standing in the presence of God then your eternity has begun. The outcome of the two questions from the paragraph above will determine where your eternity will be. The main thing that you have to consider is that it is your choice and the choices that you have made in this life which determines your eternity. Nothing that you do in this life will have any lasting effect on where you spend eternity, unless you have chosen to give your life and heart to Jesus!
It won’t matter how good you were or how moral you were considered. It won’t matter how much money you gave to the poor or to any ministry or how much you gave of your time. Until your heart belongs to Jesus and you are living for Him in this life, nothing that is done here makes one bit of difference, especially concerning your eternity. Consider where you are in life and whether you have given your life to serving God and His Kingdom or not, then make it a point to seek Him out and learn of His goodness and His love for you. Because, until you can look at someone else and love them as Jesus did, particularly someone you don’t know, then you don’t have His Love in your life. As Paul said, “I Corinthians 13:3 “And though I bestowed all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned , and have not charity (love), it propheteth me nothing.”
There are many times that this is asked of us and of God Himself. When will we see your deliverance of the church? When will you return, Lord? When will the church wake up and take salvation to the places that truly NEED it?
This question cannot be answered today. But, we as Christians need to get off of the pews and into the streets and take God’s gospel to those who may not have heard it. Yes, there are some places in the South and all over America that still haven’t heard the gospel preached in a way that people truly need to hear it right now. God loves all of you, but the sinful lives that we lead and the sins that all of us commit are not included in that love. He wants us all to come to salvation, but God doesn’t force anything on you or me. It is our response to His call, His Spirit which gets His attention and His Spirit should get our attention too.
When will we learn to be disciples and be the feet and hands of Jesus? When will we be the church that Christ wants us to be…intended for us to be? I don’t know, but the time is winding down. There is very little left to happen before the angels will sound the Trumpet of God. More people have to hear about salvation, more people need to be ministered to physically and spiritually. If the church doesn’t do this by being the REAL church that Christ intended for us to be, then who will?
Life today is hard enough, particularly in places that are devoid of churches or where there are many miles between them. Yes, there are places in the world where Jesus hasn’t been preached yet, and those are the places that need to be touched with the gospel. Working at it for a few years, telling people in your community or your county is good but will they take the message with them? When will those in Mexico hear about Jesus’ love for them? When will those in Jamaica or Honduras or Bolivia or Columbia hear about a loving, caring, powerful God Who wants to save them? These are questions which need answers and I can’t give those answers to you.
The church needs to sit down and have a Holy conference of all of its members, regardless of denomination, and determine to get out there with the message of love that we are supposed to be telling others about! We were not saved from hell to sit in the pew and say “amen” in a timid little voice! God needs people to blow the shofar and tell others about the God Who loves them so much that He sent His Son to die for them, in their place, so that by grace we can come to Him and know Him!
We are not guaranteed any time. Some of us get to live to be 8 or 9 decades old, some make it to the century birthday mark, but those years are not given at birth. We live them, one day at a time, one year at a time, one decade at a time as God wills for us to be on this Earth. It is not something that we have any control over, for the most part. Of course, if you live your life doing dangerous stunts or smoking or drinking all of the time then you can have an effect on your quality of life and its quantity too.
In the Bible, God says that man is allotted “three score and ten“, any years beyond that is a true gift from Him. Right now, I am not far from my three score but I am going to serve Him until He comes again or until my time is up, whichever comes first. Your time and mine are pretty much the same. We all get, if God wills it, 24 hours every day. Part of that we spend sleeping, part of it we are travelling to or from work, part of it we are eating and we usually work about eight hours or so depending on the job we have. So, do you see time as a friend or a master? The reason for my question is that many people rush through life day after day, like they are being pushed or forced to rush through the day. Then, some of us see a day as a gift which God has given to us and we use it and every hour that we have is precious.
This is the way that I have had to learn to live since I became disabled and unable to work at a regular job. I wake up and thank God for the day, then get my coffee and read a few chapters in the Bible. I may get inspired to write a post for this site or one of my other blogs. I make sure that our dogs are fed and the cats too and I try my best to get my son out of bed before noon. God has given me this time to enjoy in life because the age of grace that many refer to as “the Church age” is coming to an end. I don’t know when, but God does and according to all of the prophecies in His Word it won’t be too much longer.
By saying that I mean that I believe that I will be alive when the Trumpet sounds and He calls us home. If you would like to go with me, please consider giving your life to Jesus soon. Pray about it, go to church and talk to a pastor about Jesus. Ask questions about Him, seek Him in His Word and in prayer. Why do I say this? Because, after the church and the dead who are Christians are raised, the world is going to change dramatically and it won’t be for the better. God loves you and knows who you are and where you are in your life, all that you need to do is seek Him out and pray that He would forgive you of your sins, just like He forgave me of mine. I am not perfect, only Jesus can claim a sinless life, but God will forgive you if you are sincere about changing your life and following Him.
Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God: But made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name: That at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth; And that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Philippians 2:5-11 KJV
http://bible.com/1/php.2.5-11.KJV
