Category: By faith

Eternity, are you ready?


This is the most important decision that anyone can make in their life.

Most people don’t seem to worry much about life after death. They look at it as a fable or a myth that they’ve heard about at church or maybe read about in the Bible but it isn’t clear to them in any way. Until they have something happen to a friend or a family member that brings death and its consequences a bit closer to home.

Jesus did come two thousand years ago and He lived a perfect life, which we cannot, and then He gave His life on the cross for each one of you and your sins. He paid the price for all of our sins so that we wouldn’t have to IF we will believe in Him for our salvation, repent of those sins and then follow Him for the rest of our lives. That is the purpose of all Christian lives. To live our lives through His strength and power and by His atonement for our sins we are to tell others about Him so that they can know Him as their Savior.

That sounds a lot like being a missionary or a preacher? Yes, it does, but that is the command that He gave His disciples and once you have given your heart to Him and are saved through His blood, then you become His disciple and you are just as bound by that command as they were. Even if you don’t tell but one or two people what Christ did for you, if they give their life to Him and become His disciples then maybe they will tell two each and so on. Sooner or later there will be many people who have heard about Him and have given their lives to Him because you told a couple of people.

Does becoming a Christian make all of my problems go away? Not likely! Many of them may multiply because when you become a Christian, Satan now looks on you as the enemy. Before, you didn’t know Jesus and he wasn’t too worried about what you did or said to anyone. But once you begin telling others about Jesus and those people begin listening and changing their lives, now you have become a problem. Satan sees you as part of the enemy’s camp now and he may try to hurt you or your family but all you have to do is rebuke him in the name of Jesus and tell him that no part of your home or your family is his and that he should leave you and your family alone!

God loves you far more than you know or can even imagine which is why He sent His Son to pay the penalty for your sins. Then you can join His family and be with Him in Heaven for eternity, and that is a very long, long time. Much longer than our little sixty or eighty years on Earth. Make sure of your salvation before the day is through because we aren’t guaranteed tomorrow.

All of us have sinned


As it says in the book of Romans, “all have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God“. Living in the world as we do, even if you are a Christian, it is impossible to keep from sinning. We are human after all. But while we were yet sinners, Jesus Christ died for us long before we were born so that our debt in our sin was paid by Him. Being a Christian isn’t an easy job but with God all things are possible.

Jesus came and gave His life as a ransom for ALL of our souls and it is by His stripes and through His blood that we are healed and have eternal life, if we believe in Him for our salvation. Did He do this willingly? His humanity didn’t want to go through the pain and suffering which is why He sweat drops of blood in the garden, but Jesus the Son came to ransom us because He loved us, all of us. Whether we accept His gift of salvation when we feel the conviction of the Holy Spirit or not is up to us, it is our choice to choose Him as our Savior.

One small step…


Our Creator placed the “lesser light to rule the night” in the sky many years ago and today there have been celebrations and re-broadcasts of Apollo 11 landing on the moon. Fifty years ago. I was seven years old at the time and I remember hearing those words, “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind”. I never thought about being alive fifty years later to re-live those moments. I do remember how much we all hoped that mankind would get better at being mankind and better at agreeing about things.

Our problem has persisted for much longer than fifty years though. Most of our so-called “racial” problems and religious problems won’t be solved until Jesus is ruling the world one day. We don’t have the fortitude and wisdom needed to get along. So, regardless of the songs that are written or the poems which are written about peace on Earth and the fictional stories about mankind putting war aside one day, it is not going to happen until Jesus comes back!

He is the only Person capable of bringing lasting peace to our world. No ruler or any man will be able to bring peace to the whole world. He is also very good at bringing peace into your life too, if you will give Him a chance. God loves each of us so much that He gave His only Son for our sins. Jesus took all of the punishment and the separation from God the Father just so we could be forgiven. Isn’t that amazing enough to warrant giving Him your life so you can tell others about Him too?

Please seek Jesus out while you have a chance in this life because there isn’t a second chance after this one is done.

Give it away!


A missionary by the name of Jim Elliot said, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose.” He was killed taking the gospel to the Amazon Indians but later those who killed him came to know Jesus Christ as their Savior. Jesus said that we were to go and tell all of the world about Him and the salvation offered to them by belief in Him. When you are free from the burden and the heavy toll of a sinful life through the power of Jesus the best thing that you can do is to tell others about it. Give it away!

Because once you have that freedom you can’t lose it so the best thing to do is to give it to someone who needs it. Jesus came to tell the Jewish people about God’s enduring love for them and through His disciples work after He went back to be at the Father’s side they heard it and much of the world, at the time, heard it as well. Many people down through history have tried to stop Christianity from being preached and spreading but it can’t be done.

Remember, we are chosen by God and we were chosen even before the foundation of the world itself. “You did not choose me but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit” ( John 15:16). God has known each of us because He knows who will choose to follow Jesus and who will not. It is because He knows your heart (soul) and because He is our Creator, we are never forced to choose Jesus as our Savior but He knows each person who will choose to be a follower of Him. It is still our choice, but regardless of how long it takes, even the most stubborn of us will choose to follow Jesus even if it is on our death bed.

God wants us to know how much He loves us and by the sacrifice of Jesus to pay our debt from sins He did show everyone just how deep that love goes. So when we become Christians and repent of our sinful lives, following His example from His Word, the best gift that we can give anyone is to give away our best gift which is our Salvation through Jesus Christ! It is worth more than all of the gold and silver in the world and we should give it away, one person at a time.

Amen

When you pray…


Do you just sit there and ask God for stuff or is it an actual, heartfelt prayer? Is your prayer mostly for yourself or for others? Praying for others deals with selfishness because its not really about you, because nothing in this life is. Your Christian life should be about caring for others, whether it is family or not.

Jesus did not say at any time “if you pray…”, He said “when you pray…“. Prayer is a part of your life as a Christian. It is your lifeline to God and your emergency contact point with Him. Prayer can accomplish more in your life and in the lives of those you pray for than any number of doctors or lawyers or anyone else. Just as you enjoy being able to contact your parents or your children, God is our Heavenly Father, our Creator and He enjoys it when His children contact Him for our needs as well as the needs of others.

Prayer is your Spirit crying out to the Holy Spirit, the Spirit of God, Who can do all things in your life in His will for your life. He doesn’t fulfill your list of things that you want like a grandfather or like Santa. God takes care of our needs when we are living and working in His will for our lives. Asking for a Corvette or a million dollars is not the way to pray! Prayer for yourself should be according to the will of God to strengthen and enable you to work more effectively for His Kingdom and His glory. Would a million dollars do that? Maybe but not likely. Would a Corvette? No.

Prayer is necessary for our life and for our work which God has called us to do, even if you only have one day left to live. If you have more days ahead that is wonderful because you can do more for God each and every day! It doesn’t matter how much pain you are in or how much money you have or don’t have, God can use you in His Kingdom. God’s Word is the most useful and valuable possession that you can own. It is more valuable than a mountain of gold because the words contained within it came from the mind of our Creator and our Father. No amount of human wisdom can match the wisdom contained within its pages.

I truly pray that anyone reading this will search the Bible for the needs in their life because if they don’t have a relationship with Jesus…that is the greatest need that they will ever have. Why? Because without Him, eternity will be lonely, miserable and painful in hell. Why? Because it is a decision that you make when you know that you need Him and if you don’t accept Jesus as your Savior then that is where you will be.

As the thief on the cross said, “Jesus, remember me when you come into your Kingdom”. Jesus said, “Today, you will be with Me in Paradise”. That is how easy it is.

Do you know God?


This sounds like a loaded question doesn’t it? Even Satan knows God but he refused to serve Him and was kicked out of Heaven for his convincing lies which lured away a third of the angels. Most of us who have ever been in a church or listened to a sermon on TV know about God but do you know Him. Another very important question which is part of this is: does God know you?

Many of the generation who have come along in the past twenty-five years or so know more about Star Wars or the Marvel heroes or Poke’ Mon than they know about our Savior. But you asked did I know God? Well, Jesus is God the Son, then there is God the Father and God the Holy Spirit so He is your Savior if you believe in Him and the repentance that HE paid for on the cross for each of you. Knowing God is not some mystical meditation thing, because you can get to know Him by reading His Word and seeking Him as your Savior.

Doing “works” on this Earth and in this life doesn’t help you to get saved. Working for God is the fruit of a person who IS saved and is serving their Lord and Savior because He did all of the work needed to grant you salvation by His grace. We can add nothing to our salvation but we can show others our Savior by talking to them about Him or blogging about Him or teaching a class. These are the result of your salvation but they do not add to it or help God save you. As I said, Jesus did all of the work needed for your salvation, all you have to do is believe in Him and accept Him as your Savior.

It sounds too simple doesn’t it?

But if you read the book of John and the book of Romans in the New Testament you will see that your belief in Him and your surrendering to Him as your Savior is all that is required of you. It doesn’t take giving thousands of dollars to charity or mission fields or even going on a mission trip. It hinges on your reaction to His call on your life convicting you of your sins and then turning from them toward Him in repentance to walk as a new creation in His likeness! I pray that anyone reading this will seek Jesus out as their Savior and Lord because He is coming back soon. Make sure you will be a part of that first resurrection.

Disappointment


Have you felt disappointed when you attend church or after you leave? Let down by the lack of friendly people who noticed or didn’t notice that you were there? This is the way I would feel if I went to a BIG church, but if it happens at a church where there are fewer than fifty people it really hurts. This is the reason that many people attend once and then never return. Those in the church should welcome people who attend their services, especially those who are there for the first time. Don’t shake their hand like they have some disease that you are loathe to even be close to! Don’t look at their clothes and shoes and decide that they aren’t worth your time, God loves them or they wouldn’t be coming to your church for the first time!

Feeling disappointed and unwanted when you come to a service is the way that Satan wants you to feel so you won’t ever return. Listen to the message, if it is from the Word of God. If the sermon doesn’t come from the Bible with Scripture references throughout, leave when the service is over and don’t return. Make sure that you go to a Bible teaching church with believers who believe in the God of the Bible and in His Son. If the sermon is made up of “feel good” words which sound like they came from a book of self-help fluff, don’t listen to it! RUN from that church and never return!

God sent His Son, Jesus the Christ, into this world so that He could pay the debt by His blood shed on the cross and the whipping post but He overcame the death brought on by the crucifixion by His resurrection on the third day. This was planned and accomplished by the Lord long before we were born but God looked down through time and saw each of us struggling with sin and afflictions brought on by Satan and his demons. He knew that we couldn’t overcome these afflictions on our own and He made a way for us through belief in Jesus. Simple though this may sound, it is all that we need in our lives in order to be victorious all the way to our eternal home!

God loves you and He has made this way for you by His power and through the work of Jesus, the Son of God. If you have heard or felt His call on your heart and life, don’t turn away from it. None of us are guaranteed tomorrow so make sure of your salvation today because the work has been done for you. All that is needed is for you to believe in Him and ask His forgiveness of your sinful life. Ask Him to remove your pain and depression and all of your Earthly problems whatever they may be and in Jesus’ name, He will do it and give you the strength to tell others about your Risen Savior!

What do you hear?


When you go to church or any worship service in worshiping Jesus, what do you go to hear? A show with flashing lights and singing with a band and maybe a little five or ten minute sermon? Do you go to church to learn about your Savior and what He really did for you? Are you a member of a mega-church with so many people that you have to have a huge screen to see who is preaching?

Jesus warned us of the time that we are living in and it is found in the letters to the churches in the book of Revelation. The church at Laodicea was a church which reminds us of the dangers of being comfortable with our worship service.

Here is the quote from the book of Revelation:

To the Church in Laodicea
(Colossians 2:1-5)

14 To the angel of the church in Laodicea write:

These are the words of the Amen, the faithful and true Witness, the Originator of God’s creation.

15 I know your deeds; you are neither cold nor hot. How I wish you were one or the other! 16 So because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to vomit you out of My mouth!

17 You say, ‘I am rich; I have grown wealthy and need nothing.’ But you do not realize that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind, and naked. 18 I counsel you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, white garments so that you may be clothed and your shameful nakedness not exposed, and salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. 19 Those I love, I rebuke and discipline. Therefore be earnest and repent.

20 Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in and dine with him, and he with Me. 21 To the one who is victorious, I will grant the right to sit with Me on My throne, just as I overcame and sat down with My Father on His throne. 22 He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.”

We live in a time when pastors and churches water down the Word of God and they don’t teach His Truth from Scripture, just as this church was. They weren’t cold toward the message of salvation but they weren’t hot toward spreading the gospel either. They were trying but not too hard, lukewarm. Many churches and pastors today do the same thing. They compromise the Word of God by accepting sinful behavior as being normal in order to get more members on their roles. They don’t call sin what it is and teach that it is acceptable even when they know that God opinion of sin has not changed!

We cannot compromise the message of God’s Word and we shouldn’t be trying to make it more acceptable to those who are practicing sinful lifestyles which God does not approve of! Just because every other media outlet does this doesn’t mean that the church should be going along with sin even when we know that God and His Word don’t accept it nor condone it in any way. If we do this then we are no different from the world around us and we shouldn’t even be preaching from God’s Word at all. Pick out a self-help book and use it as a “bible” if you are going to be like the rest of the world.

I will preach and teach from God’s Word until He calls me home one day and if you don’t like that message then you don’t have to come to my church or read this blog anymore.

Does Jesus know you?


Knowing Jesus as your friend and your Savior is the most fulfilling relationship that you can have. So, why do we seek Him for salvation and then walk away from the relationship? Many people today do exactly that. They know they need Him and they know that they are sinful in their lives. They will seek Him out and feel His call and conviction in their lives and maybe even accept Him as their Savior but when things don’t work out the way they want them to, they walk away from Him.

Knowing Who He is and having Him as your Savior is the best relationship that you can have. But if you only want to know Him as a Savior and Lord and not as your Savior and Lord there is nothing gained for you except knowledge of Him. Knowledge doesn’t bring salvation. Satan and the demons know Who Jesus is but that doesn’t help them because they won’t serve Him. 

There are times that I think it is that word which turns people away. They don’t want to be a disciple or a Christian because they don’t want to serve Jesus. He gave His life and His blood for your soul to have a chance at salvation so I believe that we do owe Him our service and our life. God has given us all of the best, even though we don’t see it that way. He has provided us with a sun that isn’t too hot and a planet to live on that isn’t too hot or cold. He prepared it with lots of water and air to breathe and land that we could cultivate for our food and things that we need.

So many things that we have been blessed with, whether you live in America or anywhere else in the world because God loves us so deeply. I know there are diseases and wars going on and famines and earthquakes and hurricanes that happen from time to time, but God is still in control of it all. If He weren’t we wouldn’t be here. There are so many problems which we could have that He has prevented and then there are others which we have caused. Not “global warming”, but so many other problems in our societies just because we have refused to worship the One True God. 

Seek Him out while there is yet time to do so because there will be one day in the near future when He takes the church and all of those who have given their lives to Him to Heaven. When that happens, there will be hell on Earth until He says that it is enough. Think about it.

Feast or famine


This saying has almost become cliche’ today and they use it for so many things until the meaning is almost lost to the younger generation. In the world both of these are easy to recognize and their meanings are very clear. Feast is when things are going really well and you have money and enough food to eat. Even your career is going well when you are feasting.

Famine, on the other hand is when things are not going well at all. Your home is being foreclosed and taken from you, you’ve lost your job and there is no money for food. You may even be living in a place where there has been a famine in more ways than one and people are starving to death.

But what if you applied these terms to your spiritual life? How would you read them and assign meaning to them then? Does feast refer to the days that you attend church with other believers? Does that mean that you don’t seek God counsel during the week, so you are going through a famine in your spiritual life between Sabbath’s? Christians are not supposed to live their spiritual lives this way.

Yes, you do go to a worship service to be fed the Word and taught about it but when you leave then you are supposed to fellowship with God until the next time. The disciples didn’t just meet up with Jesus on those days when He was teaching in the synagogue. They were with Him every day regardless of which direction He was going or who they might meet. They were near Him day and night so they heard His teachings every day not just weekly or once a month.

John even wrote in his gospel, “if all of the things were written about Him that He did, the world could not contain the books“. I paraphrased John’s words but you get the idea. Jesus did many miracles that we will never know about until we are with Him. But living a Christian life in “feast or famine” mode is not the way to live in Christ and Christ in you! The Holy Spirit, the third of the Trinity, is with you from the time you are saved. You have a member of the Trinity living with you, inside you and He is every bit as much God as the Father and the Son are. I don’t think that we consider that we have a part of the Creator Who teaches you about Jesus and helps you to understand His Word.

Living the sanctified life of a Christian, saved by His Grace, would not be possible if the Holy Spirit wasn’t there to show us and teach us when we are reading and learning from God’s Word. We wouldn’t act as a Christian in the slightest degree if it weren’t for the Spirit touching us and teaching us when we are tempted to do something we shouldn’t! God gives us the strength and His Spirit to be able to make it one day at a time in our walk with Him and that is what we should do. Get through today, then study God’s Word a bit tonight, then get through tomorrow and so on until we are called home.

PS: If there are any prayer requests or something that you would like for me to pray about, anything at all, leave a comment. I will add your request to the others that I get from the community.