Category: when you feel His call in your heart

You are saved by His Grace


For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them. Ephesians 2:8‭-‬10 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/eph.2.8-10.KJV

There is no other way to be saved from an eternity in hell. His grace and faith in Him is the only way to be a saved child of the Living God! Believe it so that you can be in heaven when your eternity begins. It could be tomorrow or tonight or next year but when it comes you will know it.

We need more respect


Your Father knows but He wants to hear your request


Bible study


That is something that I used to dislike with a passion. Why? Because I thought I was saved and didn’t need to study the Bible. Kinda like having “insurance” against the flames. At the time I thought being saved just meant accepting Jesus as your Savior…period. I didn’t think there was anything that I should do from that point on. But when you truly are saved and you realize that you really needed Him…that is when God truly got your attention. Before you were trying to “do it yourself”. You walked down the aisle and you might’ve even been baptized but you only got wet. There was no change and you didn’t feel the need to change anything.

That is the type of “faith” I had many years ago. It wasn’t real. Even though I thought it was for a while. But eventually, I would go right back to where I was before. As they say, “it didn’t take”. The fact is, I was just trying to do it myself. When God touches your heart and breaks it, He shows you why you need Him and that He can fill that empty place that you’ve known about for a long time. When this happens, studying your Bible becomes real. It teaches you about your Savior and your Creator. The Bible also reads your spirit, because every time you read a chapter or a book in it you will find a pearl of new wisdom or truth that you didn’t see before.

Studying God’s Word is the best way to learn about Him and His voice so you will know when you hear Him speak. If you don’t know His voice then Satan can speak to you and deceive you easily. While I was a pastor, I read through the Bible at least once every year. Since I’ve been away from preaching in a church, I actually read it more than once per year. God’s Word never gets old or stale because it is His Living Word. Give your heart to Him and get acquainted with Him more than ever by reading His Word every day.

Wisdoms beginning


The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: And the knowledge of the holy is understanding. For by me thy days shall be multiplied, And the years of thy life shall be increased. If thou be wise, thou shalt be wise for thyself: But if thou scornest, thou alone shalt bear it. Proverbs 9:10‭-‬12 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/pro.9.10-12.KJV

This fear is not the kind that you feel watching a horror movie. It is a respectful fear of the Person and the power of God because He is your Creator and your Savior. It is the kind of respect that some of us grew up knowing about. At one time we were taught to respect our elders and our teachers and the police and many others who were in positions of authority. We even respected our parents and grandparents…imagine that? If you were to ask a young person today if they respected their parents or their grandparents many of them would likely laugh at you.

Respect is something that is foreign to our culture and to many in society today. We don’t have respect for people because of their job or position and it seems that we don’t have respect for many things that were respected in society a few decades ago. Why? Because we don’t teach respect or even the reasons for it at home and especially in schools today. God demands respect because of Who He is but people don’t want to hear that today. They don’t believe that He exists and if HE does they don’t think He cares about them. Why? Because they aren’t learning this at home or in churches because fewer and fewer people attend church services today.

Comfort and feelings will cause failure in the future. If you only follow your comfortable life and how you feel about this or that, you will always fail. God’s wisdom is found in the Bible and it is the only book that contains wisdom that is infallible, particularly in regard to money. Seek His wisdom in the use of and the ability to use money in the way that God approves and your life will be more blessed than you can imagine.

We’re all broken…


In some way this is true. Some people are more broken than others and some may not realize that they are broken even a little bit. Life tends to do this to us in one way or another. It may start out as a small crack when we are bullied in school or maybe someone close to you dies for one reason or another. Then, later that crack gets a bit wider and a part of us feels broken, like it may never heal.

Brokenness in today’s society is accepted to a certain extent. We are usually surprised if we find someone who has not had an issue in their life that left a scar or a crack. So…why is that? It began about sixty years ago (actually it has been 59 years this year). The year that John F. Kennedy was killed and a great writer died, C.S. Lewis. They died on the same day actually but one died of natural causes and the other was killed by an assassin.

Their deaths left a crack in the world I believe and it is one that hasn’t really been fixed. It is likely that it will never be in my lifetime. In America, JFK’s death caused a ripple effect that has lasted until now. The hope and youthful exuberance of his Presidency died with him that day and America has been mourning it ever since. This may come as a shock to some who follow this site but I believe that much of our cultural problems began with that gunshot in Dallas and they continue until this day.

We kinda gave up on religion in a way on that day as well. It just seems that our entire country lost their faith in God which had seemed to keep us going before that day. I realize that this post is not as encouraging as most of my other posts but I do want to end here on a positive note. Jesus said that He would come back to take all of us who believe in Him for our salvation to be with Him. That is the Hope that I am holding onto today and I pray that you will too.

Learn to listen with your soul


https://bible.com/stories/3531

This is a group of pictures that create a story for you to follow while you are learning to listen to God’s voice. All of us who are Christians have gone through this at some point. We wonder, “How can I know that I am hearing God’s voice?”. The learning process that you have to go through is not something that you are told in Bible school or even Sunday school and it is this omission that causes many people to walk away after they’ve become Christians. They don’t lose their salvation but they do miss out on the joy of getting to know Jesus and His Father, God.

There is a learning curve to it and the road to knowing God does have some ruts and bumps in it but Jesus told His disciples that they would have tribulation in the world. Troubles always come and when you are trying to learn better knowledge of God, it seems that they come in waves…sometimes very big waves.

Why do I say that there is a learning curve to being a Christian? Because it’s true. Making the change to being His is not a “snap your fingers” decision nor is it that simple. The Holy Spirit touches your heart and you feel the need for Jesus and the salvation that comes with Him. Then, once you have accepted Him as your Savior, your walk with Him begins. That is why He said to “take up your cross and follow Me”. Your daily life with Him requires you to place your old ways and your old self on that cross every day because your life is not about you anymore.

You have to look at the eternal picture and see that your life with Christ is never going to end. There will be a transition from this life to your eternal life but when you consider the other eternal destination had you rejected Jesus I believe you will say “It was worth it!”.

God is faithful…


Many days, we feel that He isn’t faithful but He is. We aren’t tuned in to His timing though. We don’t want to wait. Like everyone else in the world…we want instant faith, instant answers to our prayers, and drive-through sermons and salvation. But God’s Holy Spirit and His timing don’t work like that. Our prayers, even if they are fueled by faith, will be answered His way and in His time. Most believers don’t have the patience to live with God’s timing. Anyone outside of the church, and many inside it, have no patience to wait on God’s timing. It takes a few years before we learn this lesson in our spiritual walk with Him, so whether you want to or not you will learn patience if you are going to walk with Him daily.

In our lives, God uses many situations to bring us to the level of maturity that it takes to walk with Him and wait on Him too. Sometimes it is sickness. Sometimes it is a death in the family that will draw us closer to Him. It may take a few years, but eventually, God will bring you to that place where He needs you to be. Living and walking with God on a daily basis is not an easy or painless lesson to learn but to be successful in your walk with Him, He will bring you along just the same.

22 Because of the loving devotion of the LORD we are not consumed, for His mercies never fail.23 They are new every morning; great is Your faithfulness! 24 “The LORD is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in Him.” Lamentations 3

This is the type of faith that every Christian should have in God and in the Lord Jesus. Most of us think that we need to ask God for more faith so we can believe like this but the faith that He gives us to believe in Jesus as our Savior is all we will ever need. Sometimes it doesn’t feel like we have much faith but recall what Jesus said, “if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain ‘Move from here to there and it will happen“.

Bad days…


God is with me even on my bad days. I don’t feel like doing anything or writing much but He has inspired me to do it anyway. Why? Because He is my Savior and my Friend. He is Life and the Author of it, so whether you are feeling down or depressed or just “not feelin’ it”, He is still there with you every step of the way. God loves us whether we are good or not and He can bring our lives to the point of being even better than they could be without Him.

So…truly with Him in your life, there are no bad days just days where you don’t feel as “up” as you did yesterday or the day before. That’s the best way that I can describe it. One of the performers on AGT in the past few years really touched my heart when she came on. Her “stage name” was Nightbirde. I say was because her cancer came back before she could make it to the finals and she passed away. But her spirit was infectious and happy even with cancer hanging in the background. Her advice after her audition was this: “You can’t wait until life isn’t hard anymore before deciding to be happy”… Nightbirde

The only thing that I would add to her advice is that “You can’t wait until life is great to feel joy”. Joy is the giddy cousin of happiness and you can feel it even when you don’t really feel happy.

God’s promises come true