As free, and not using your liberty for a cloak of maliciousness, but as the servants of God.
1 Peter 2:16 KJV
https://bible.com/bible/1/1pe.2.16.KJV
Category: Abide in Him
Writing for the Lord
At some point in the past seven or eight years, I have been told to abandon this blogging thing. I was told this by some well-meaning people but I cannot stop doing this because it is as much my job as being a preacher is. God called me to do this and until He stops me, I will continue. Last night, I wrote an article about my early life and it caused me to think about why I do this and who I am doing this for. It is not for myself, it is for anyone who will read and be searching for their Savior specifically. I do this for the same reason that I preach.
God gives each of us a talent or an ability and if we belong to Him, we should use it for His Kingdom and glory. There are many in the world who are using their talents for making money or to push a cause forward that they believe in. My cause is the cause of Jesus and why He came to Bethlehem so long ago. Why am I trying to push this cause out into the world?
Because the world matters to God and each of you who read this matters to God which is why Jesus was sent to die on the cross and rise again! God could look through the ages and see that mankind would need a Savior and the only Person Who could fill that job was One of the Godhead.
Mankind, then and now, is predisposed to sin in some form in this world. We are hard-wired this way because of the sins past down through the lineage of Adam. Whether you believe that we are created in God’s image or not makes little difference. The point is this: our ancestors rebelled against the way that God had set things up. Even though they had everything at first, they were tempted to seek a way that put them in charge rather than God. We have been doing this ever since then.
Why? Because we are stubborn and like little children, we want to do it our way.
God knew this and He saw it coming. Although He could’ve put a stop to it He didn’t. People have been asking why for thousands of years. The only reason that I have been able to grasp from my Bible study is that God has always allowed a choice to His creation. Even the angels had a choice of serving Him. But why did God do this? Because of His love for His creation, that is why.
Taking “choice” away from angels or humanity would make us and the angels more like animals living by instinct than created beings with a soul. God has always wanted fellowship with His creation and that is something that only comes by voluntarily worshipping Him. Make sure of your relationship by seeking Him today because He is waiting for you…patiently.
I don’t know you…
What does this mean? “I don’t know you!” It is a putdown from some today and an eternal sentence from God. There is another way which Jesus put it in His teaching in Luke 13:27. He said this: Jesus answered, 24 “Make every effort to enter through the narrow door. For many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able. 25 After the master of the house gets up and shuts the door, you will stand outside knocking and saying, ‘Lord, open the door for us.’ But he will reply, ‘I do not know where you are from.’ 26 Then you will say, ‘We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.’ 27 And he will answer, ‘I tell you, I do not know where you are from. Depart from me, all you evildoers.’
31 When the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, He will sit on His glorious throne. 32 All the nations will be gathered before Him, and He will separate the people one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will place the sheep on His right and the goats on His left.
34 Then the King will say to those on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave Me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave Me something to drink, I was a stranger and you took Me in, 36 I was naked and you clothed Me, I was sick and you looked after Me, I was in prison and you visited Me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You something to drink? 38 When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? 39 When did we see You sick or in prison and visit You?’
40 And the King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me.’ 41 Then He will say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave Me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave Me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not take Me in, I was naked and you did not clothe Me, I was sick and in prison and you did not visit Me.’ 44 And they too will reply, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to You?’ 45 Then the King will answer, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for Me.’ 46 And they will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
God can use you if you will obey Him. Not acting like a Christian or going through the motions to appear to be a Christian. The disciples walked with Jesus and they still had trouble believing Him until He rose from the dead. When He came into their midst after they had seen HIm flogged and whipped and crucified and then buried…then their faith exploded! From the day of Pentecost onward the church was persecuted mercilessly but their numbers still grew!
Why? Because they knew that the disciples wouldn’t believe in a lie. They would not preach a lie and you couldn’t be healed by a lie. That is what the church today needs to see in faith and then walk in that faith!
My early life…
Life, for me, was not easy. Especially when I was young. I had known that my family was broken and the school did not help. None of my classmates except for maybe one or two had a stepdad or mom. So nobody could identify with my family life. Most of them didn’t want to know me or who I was, regardless of my family situation. Because I didn’t live in town.
I lived in the country with my grandparents. I had to ride a school bus to get to school. I know, all of these reasons don’t sound like a real reason to look down on someone but I could feel it. Even though I don’t remember anyone saying anything to me, it was the tone of their voices or the way they looked at my clothes or my shoes. Did all of this affect me?
YES!
Not just this but also the custody and child support hearings which my parents were going through at the time added to the anxiety and the feeling of being less than what others expected. I was never told this, of course, but looking back on it from the point of being fifty years older I can recognize the feelings which were there. Even if I didn’t know what they were at the time. I mean, how can you know about these things when you are six or seven years old?
Now I can look back at the self-destructive behavior which I began even before I was a teenager and I can see that this was caused by my situation and not by myself.
Do I blame my outcome on my classmates? NO! In many ways, being in school with them very likely helped because most of them came from Christian homes. I did as well, but I was angry. Angry at God and my own Dad and my mother…truly I was angry at everything around me in some form or another. As I got older, I turned that anger inward and began smoking and drinking. I had a few wrecks before I graduated from high school because I was so drunk at the time I can barely remember them. Even on my senior trip, I had gotten so drunk the night before until I have no idea how I made it home. The next morning I still had enough alcohol in my system that even drinking coffee before going to school made me drunk again.
I would say that I was on a self-destructive path, which is why I am writing this because I never believed I would live long enough to be in my late fifties. I pray that someone reading this who may be in a similar situation might turn away from their self-hate and seek the only One Who can help you.
Have I had other problems with alcohol? Yes, but not quite to the extent that I did during high school. I have gone out and drank alcohol but I have not gotten drunk enough to not remember how I got somewhere or with whom I was at the time. I also never drank beer to the point of being or getting drunk. When I drank, I drank whiskey or bourbon. I intended to get drunk.
Why do I write this now? Because things have changed. I am no longer angry and I am not trying to kill myself with whiskey. I am writing this to show that even though I am a pastor now, I wasn’t always someone that could get up and preach or tell others that living for Jesus and with Him in your heart is the way to live. Yes, I do buy whiskey occasionally but it isn’t for the reasons which I did over forty years ago.
If I buy any today it is for relaxing before bed or for making some home-made cold medicine, nothing more. I don’t get drunk and I don’t drink unless I am NOT driving. I am not claiming to be perfect or anything other than a recovered drunk. For a while, I had worried that I was an alcoholic but I think that most of my problems with alcohol were my own and not a disease.
God has been good to me these past ten years or so. His blessings and His grace have carried me through some hard times with finances and sickness but I know that He is in control and at some point soon, He will come for His church and hopefully take me home with Him. I urge you to seek Him out and give your heart to Him too because there will soon be a time which will test the whole world and it will happen after the church, the body of believers, are taken to Heaven. Make sure that you are part of that number who have gone with Him.
The pain of change
Growth can be painful. Whether it is by working out or by any other exercise, muscles become painful when we use those which have not been used for a while. Sometimes the pain lasts for days, but if there is no pain then strength is not gained.
Just as the pain comes upon us when we exercise, we must also go through some pains while being a Christian. Because when we become Christians we are but babes. We are just beginning to learn about our salvation in Jesus and need to grow in grace with God. It is painful, to begin with as a Christian because we are still at war with our old nature as a sinner. Learning to be a Christian is a process and even though we receive Jesus and His Spirit when we have given our heart to Him, it does take some time to grow and mature in our faith.
Sometimes this growth is painful because we are not like we were before and we have moved toward God and away from the world. Our old “friends” are still in the world and they cannot understand the change which has come upon us. Is it painful? Yes, it very likely is painful when they want to do something which goes against your new faith. You would feel torn between serving Jesus or going with your friends. Some people choose to go with their friends and compromise their faith which causes pain to our new heart.
If you do this enough it will soon become easy to ignore the pain or not notice it at all. Some Christians claim that even though they are living in the world and not growing in their faith that they will still have a place in Heaven one day. While that may be true, your eternity will be different than it would’ve been had you listened to your heart and the Holy Spirit. Your rewards will be fewer and your life in Christ will be dull and lacking in the power to resist the temptations of the world around you.
Life has many times which are painful. Some of them come upon us because God allows them to, some of them come upon us because of our lack of growth and faith in Him Who saved us. We bring much of our pains into our lives because of our lack of growth in our faith and learning of God and His ways. Because there are many who think that once they have given their heart to Jesus and done the things which point toward a new life in Him, many of these so-called “carnal Christians” just wait until the day when they get to go into eternity.
The problem with this thinking is that if there hasn’t been a true change of heart which brings you to a true saving faith in Jesus, then you aren’t a Christian at all. You think you are because you do all of the things which a Christian does, mostly, but you still go back to your old life and your old habits. Without a change in your heart and a true repentance from your old ways, you can’t be seen as any different from the person you were before.
Without a broken heart knowing that your sins were part of the nails which placed Jesus on the cross, there will be no change. Because if you aren’t broken in your heart and your spirit knowing that you are responsible for Jesus’ death, you won’t reap the benefits of a resurrected heart as a child of God!
Do you have eternity in mind?
Most of us live our lives day to day and really don’t think about eternity until we are at a funeral or at someone’s bedside who knows they don’t have long in this world. But why don’t we? I mean, if you are a Christian or a Muslim or a Jewish person who is devout in their chosen religion, eternity is present in your religion! So why don’t we live our lives with at least some idea of entering into eternity?
I think it has to do with the fact that most of us don’t like to pack. We don’t really like to get ready to go anywhere, even if we like to travel. Getting ready for a trip is tedious and boring and not really any fun at all but in order to enjoy your trip it needs to be done. Getting ready for eternity doesn’t involve packing or travel accommodations or tickets, but it does involve making sure that you have your faith bound up in Jesus and your belief in Him as your Savior needs to be solid!
No amount of good living or moral living or works or money will buy you a ticket to Heaven. Belief in Jesus as your Savior and walking with Him every day expecting His return and looking for Him in all of your life’s endeavors will give you expectant hope in Him! Living your life as a Christian is about the most denied faith in the world today because there are so many “false prophets” stating that there are many ways to get to Heaven.
This is blatantly FALSE!! Jesus said, “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life, no man comes to the Father except through Me.”
I know this sounds elitist and narrow but the way to eternal life is a path, not a highway and it only goes through Jesus Christ. Seek Him in your worship, learn about Him as your Savior and ask Him to be your Savior so that your travel into eternity will be a smooth trip.
Believe in the Person of Jesus Who did sacrifice everything for each of you.
Life is painful sometimes
We live and work in a world of hurts and pain. Some of it is from painful memories and some of it comes from family members who never talk to each other. Many times the pain comes from the realization that our world is getting worse instead of better. Why is this happening? That is easy, God said that it would get this way before He comes back.
Everything that is happening in the world, good and bad, is happening because of God’s sovereign rule over everything. It isn’t something that is surprising or unexpected, at least it isn’t in God’s sight. He knew that the earthquake which happened was going to happen. He knew about the hurricanes and the mudslides and all of the fires which have ravaged the western U.S. I know that many people are going to say “If God is so loving and good, then why did all those people die in those disasters?”.
I don’t know. God allows some bad things to happen, but why they happen is not given to mankind to know or understand. He knows that some good will come from the bad things, but only He can see that. We aren’t gifted with the understanding of those things which we see as bad or terrible from our perspective. I am sure that God has prevented many bad things from happening in your life and mine and we likely didn’t even know about it.
God looks at us even before we accept Jesus as our Savior, even before we were ever born, and He can see the person that we can be as a saved and sanctified child of His. He knows exactly what we can do and what we will accomplish for Him long before we belong to Jesus! He doesn’t discount us as a “lost cause” nor does He look at us as someone who isn’t useful to Him. Every person on Earth is useful to Him IF they give their hearts to Jesus and continue to mature in their faith.
What does that mean? It means that becoming a Christian is a process. One which takes some time. Yes, you accept Jesus in a moment but that is not the end of it. It takes a walk…a daily walk with Him in faith and prayer and learning more from His Word than you ever thought was contained in the Bible!
Consider it this way, a potter throws a lump of clay on a wheel and takes his fingers and puts a dent in the top. But it isn’t a bowl or a cup yet. It takes more molding and more pressure and more molding until it finally begins to take the shape which the potter knew that it could be. That is the same process which God takes us through after we have accepted Jesus as our Savior.
Some hardship and some pain draw us closer to Him, learning more about Him, cultivating our prayer life and our daily time with Him until we finally begin to take the shape which God knew we could be. The process is never really over until we die and are brought into Heaven. That is our graduation in a way because this life is just the preparation for our eternal life of service with Him and for Him.
Be changed by Him
When we come to church and worship Him we are supposed to be changed in our heart.
“Why? I like my life the way it is!” Ok, so why do you have trouble at home or at work or at school? Are you more concerned about what you have or how you feel or how others are treating you than you are about those who are hurting around you? I realize that our culture today tells us that we are important and that our lives matter and that our personal ideas about the truth are ours and nobody should tell us any different. But…you know what that kind of thinking does to you and your relationships and to your life?
It gives us an “I” problem. It causes us to think more about our ideas and our things our lives. It causes us to concentrate more on what is good for me.
When you feel the Holy Spirit of God touching your life and your heart, He opens it up to the possibilities of being a part of a much bigger crowd. One that is part of God’s family and a crowd which is made up of people who are just like you. Some of them may be darker in skin tone or have a funny sounding name, but God has touched each of them and changed their heart so that we are part of His family. It doesn’t matter how much money you have or how much your car or truck cost or any of that material life which is so valued in the world today.
God LOVES you! If you have felt or maybe you are feeling His touch in your heart today, don’t turn away from Him. Turn your eyes toward Jesus and ask Him to come into your life and change your life into a life which will make a HUGE difference in the world around you. He can do that and He will do it because He knows that you are the only person who can reach that man or woman down the road. You are the only one who can explain God’s plan of salvation to them or maybe to someone you work with.
Your life can be so different from the life that others lead with their “I” problems and their “me and mine” problems. Their life is centered on themselves and on what they can get or have. The problem with doing this is that your circle of friends doesn’t get very big when you live this way. Nobody wants to be around a selfish person who only thinks of themselves!
We are encouraged to be outgoing even when we don’t feel like it. When Jesus is in your heart and is a part of your daily life, you are open to the world and not just in a box or a cage by yourself. Its no fun living like that even when you have convinced yourself that you like it that way!
Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness and all of the things which you need will be provided in your life. Notice that this promise speaks of your needs not your desires or your wants. God will provide for you by the riches of Jesus Christ in Heaven, not of those things which are luxuries in this world, but your needs.
Be changed in His image. We are made in the image of God, but since the fall in the Garden, mankind has had a spirit of rebellion in their hearts from birth. Give your heart to Jesus and follow Him in all of your ways, conforming to the likeness of Jesus so that your ways and your life will be a reflection of Him rather than your desires and your ideas.
Freedom from depravity
The Christian faith gives believers the grace they don’t deserve but so desperately need. The depravity of humankind is obvious, especially today. Our faith grants us , as believer’s, a direct relationship with God, whom we can approach with freedom. Once you understand the value of your salvation you understand how tightly the relationship needs to be held onto. Many people today think that Christianity deprives you of fun and having a life but that is not true.
God’s rules, the Ten Commandments, are guidelines for us to live by and after you have given your heart to Jesus and have begun following Him in your life they are easy to follow. Why? Because your relationship with Jesus is more important to you than your old life and your old ways. This is why believers need to treat their salvation as their most valuable asset.
I know the word “depravity” sounds offensive but think about all of the sex trafficking and child slaves that are kidnapped for perverts around the world. If that isn’t depravity I don’t know what is! Our world is under the control and rule of Satan and his agents so much of our world is part of his world. Granted, God allows him to do this and He is in control by limiting what he can do and how far he can go but it is still our adversary that is in charge on Earth.
God has always been in control of him and has placed limits on what he can do and what is not allowed by God. We see some of these things as either God is not in control or He is a mean and hateful God. He is nothing like that at all! If God were not in control I imagine that Satan and his cohorts would’ve made sure that mankind would likely wipe himself from the Earth long before now.
We should seek out God and learn about Him and His love for us, because there is no other way you can learn of Him if you don’t seek Him for yourself. God provided a way for your sins to be wiped clean so that you could interact with Him and be in Heaven one day as a redeemed child of God.
Remember, God has always had a plan for each of us and yet we try to live as if He doesn’t exist at all. He hung the stars in space and placed all of them in their places so that their light shines on us and we behold His glory by His creation. I ask that you give your life to Him while there is still time to do so. Seek Him out for your salvation, learn about Him by studying His Word and listening to Bible teaching and preaching. Because there is no better way to know someone than to read their letters.
Little things
How many times do little things get in the way of relationships? Sometimes the things which get in the way are so small until you barely know what they were. But they still make a dent in other people’s feelings. Sometimes the dent is bigger than you think and sometimes the damage takes a real toll on the relationship. Occasionally, the damage causes a rift or a split in the relationship.
Then what do you do?
You repent, say “I’m sorry” for the fortieth time, and move on. Each day…every day we go through times which will test our patience and our faith in God sometimes. But each day we must determine for ourselves to walk with God that day, then do it again tomorrow, and again the next day. This is what Jesus meant about taking up our cross each day and following Him.
The cross you have to bear is sometimes a difficult one. It could be a disease or a financial hardship or maybe an ailing parent or child or it could be depression or any number of other things which we all face at some point. Why bring this up if these are little things in God’s eyes but in our life they can be pretty big at times?
Because each of us has these “problems”, regardless of the size of them or the weight that they carry. Nobody is immune to the trials of life regardless of what they may be! Each of us has to live through them but we should remember that we don’t live through them alone. God is always beside us and ready to help us with strength for our spirit and for our struggles.
Jesus said, “I will be with you, until the end of the age“; I know, its a paraphrase of His words, but He meant what He said. God doesn’t mince words and He doesn’t lie about anything. When He said this He meant it! The “age” He was speaking of is the one we are in now, the church age, and if you have been paying attention to any news you will know that people are not paying much attention to the church or the message which we preach.
Your sin debt has been paid! Everyone’s sin debt has been paid, but most don’t want to believe that it has been nor do they want to believe in the One Who paid it for them. God loves each person individually and deeply! He is not a vengful God nor is He an angry God, He is a loving God Who wants to know you better.
Give Him a chance to know you and for you to get to know Him. I promise, you won’t regret it.
The Living Message of Christ 