Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted. Matthew 5:4 KJV https://bible.com/verse-of-the-day/mat.5.4/74704
Category: Choose to follow Jesus Christ
Do you believe?
God is our Creator. Is that something that is beyond your mind to believe? Are you too stubborn to believe it or do you think that you actually came from an ape? God made us in His image and He created the apes but He did NOT use an ape as the pattern for humanity. God created the entire universe from nothing. It did not spew out of a microscopic point of dense matter in the Big Bang, God spoke it into existence with His Word. Don’t even consider that your teachers know more than God because God gave them their intellect and their ability to learn what they teach children today.
In the public schools, teachers are supposed to follow a pattern of teaching. They call it a “lesson plan”, I call it indoctrination of our youth. Whatever you call it, since the Bible and the morals that it teaches has been out of the public school system for more than fifty years, our children have been taught what to say and what to believe by teachers. In college it gets worse because of the predominant theory of evolution of all species. Yes, I called it a theory because you can’t prove that one animal in the past evolved into another. Scientists will argue this point until they are blue in the face but the fact is that there are no fossils which show any transitional phase between one form and another.
Back to God now. He spoke everything into existence and it was good until mankind mucked it up and decided they wanted that one fruit that God had told them they could not and should not eat. Have you ever noticed a toddler do that? If you tell them that there is something that they can’t have because it is bad for them they will work hard to gain that one thing more than any other. It doesn’t matter what it is, if it is denied to them because you say so they will work ten times as hard to get it rather than be satisfied with what they already have.
Mankind has not changed one bit. If there is something that this group has that another group wants it may start a war. A theif will steal from your home something that he wants just simply because you have it and he doesn’t. Sometimes he will sell what he stole for the money but his satisfaction is that he took it from you because in his mind you didn’t deserve it anyway. God can see all of this going on in our world today and it breaks His heart but He has held off the end of the age until the time that He will send for His bride, the church. Why has He held off so long? So that every person will have the opportunity to claim salvation through Jesus Christ.
I pray that everyone who reads these posts will take a minute and seek God in prayer. He will answer your prayer for salvation and your eternity will be set in the Lamb’s Book of Life. Your name cannot be erased from that point on. Your life with Jesus is assured. Then you should begin to walk with Him each day. Reading the Bible, praying about what you read and praying for someone that you know whether they are sick or just need to know Jesus as their Savior. Be His voice and His feet from that point on because He gave His life to pay your penalty for the sins that you committed or will commit. Don’t turn away from His call in your life.
The Lord is your fortress
1 Except the LORD build the house, They labour in vain that build it: Except the LORD keep the city, The watchman waketh but in vain. Psalm 127:1 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/psa.127.1.KJV
Dead men walking…
I know that there are many people who like to watch “zombie” shows and movies. Why? Because it’s entertainment I suppose. The thing is…if you haven’t given your heart to Jesus and repented of your “normal” sinful life then you are walking around dead in your sins. We are dead toward God when we are still sinners and have not accepted Jesus as our Savior. So in reality we are dead men and women walking until the Holy Spirit revives our heart and brings us into a new Life in Christ!
You won’t accept Jesus as your Savior if the Holy Spirit doesn’t convict you of your NEED for salvation. We will continue to live as dead men without the conviction to make us see exactly what we are and Who we need in our hearts! Jesus loves you so much that He died on that cross two thousand years ago to pay the penalty for your sins. He didn’t have any sin of His own but He died for the whole world even though He knew that many of them would never accept His offer of Life through the grace of God because it is a gift from God to each of us. We cannot earn it nor can we pay for any part of our salvation. He paid it all!
Your soul is worth the life of the Son of God. Even if there had only been one person, such as the thief on the cross, that Jesus could die for and provide salvation for through His shed blood and resurrection, He would’ve done it anyway. That kind of love is hard for us to understand or comprehend. Our Creator loves each of you with that deep abiding love. I can’t explain it to you, I can’t even describe that love because as far as we are concerned that kind of love is impossible for us to know in our mortal life. The only time that we will know it and feel it truly is when we fall to our knees in front of the One Who died for us. Even then I don’t think we will understand it. It will be so overwhelming in its capacity that even in our glorified bodies we won’t be able to stand in the truth of it.
I pray that everyone who reads this blog might seek out God to know Jesus as their Lord and Savior. Don’t put it off because we are not guaranteed to even wake up in the morning.
It’s never too late…
12 Therefore also now, saith the LORD, turn ye even to me with all your heart, and with fasting, and with weeping, and with mourning: Joel 2:12 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/jol.2.12.KJV
I’m not ashamed of the gospel!
16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek. Romans 1:16 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/rom.1.16.KJV
God gives us His strength
4 Trust ye in the Lord for ever: for in the Lord Jehovah is everlasting strength: Isaiah 26:4 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/isa.26.4.KJV
When you are afraid…
3 What time I am afraid, I will trust in thee. Psalm 56:3 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/psa.56.3.KJV
All of us are afraid at some point in our lives. We may not admit it and we certainly won’t tell anyone that we are afraid…but deep down we are. It doesn’t matter if you are a police officer or a firefighter or in the Special Forces of the Military everyone feels fear. It is how we deal with it that defines our actions and our reactions in those situations. Courage is the control of our reaction to fear.
God is with us when we are afraid and if you are a Christian you have angels who are with you as your guard in front and behind you regardless of where you may be. So why are we afraid? Fear is one of the emotions that Satan uses to put doubts in our mind about God and His faithfulness. Fear can paralyze you and cause you to run when you should “be still and know that I am God“. Realize that whatever your circumstance and whatever may be causing you to fear something or someone…God is bigger than your fear and the cause of your fear!
God sent His Son, Jesus, to pay the price for your sins and mine so that we could be welcomed into His family. God determined that this would be necessary all the way back in the Garden of Eden, long before any of us were known or thought of by anyone except Himself. He knew that we would need a Savior and that Savior would have to be one of the Trinity…His Son. Jesus came to the Patriarchs as the Angel of the Lord or the Commander of the Lord’s Army. He was also the Rock from which the water flowed in the wilderness and the Bread from heaven that sustained them. In Babylon Jesus saved the three Hebrews who were thrown into the furnace by being the One that was “like a son of the gods” in their trial with them.
God is always with us in our trials, whatever they may be so when you feel fear or you are afraid for some reason…pray a prayer for God’s Presence to be near you and to guard you and give you the strength to face it and move on.
Are we all guilty?
Every human after the fall is guilty of the same sin that Adam was guilty of. The sin of disobedience. Those of us who have chosen not to believe in Jesus for your salvation have disobeyed the call of God. If you have felt the call of God in your heart, it doesn’t matter if it was at church or a radio program or on the TV, then you should answer that call. Some people will answer and ask Jesus into their hearts and some will refuse.
So…are we guilty or not? Yes, we are all guilty of being sinners before we come to Jesus for our salvation. Can we be redeemed? Yes, even for the most heinous crimes imaginable and for the least crimes as well. Every sin, no matter how small, is equal in God’s sight! Sometimes we look at these things, meaning sins, with the wrong outlook. Stealing a pen is still stealing. Looking at a woman/girl with lust in your heart/mind is still adultery even if you never touch her. Your mind can conjure up all sorts of imaginings that you may not even be physically capable of doing sexually but it is still a sin in your mind. Our minds are the places where everything that we do and say or imagine comes to pass. That is why we should “capture every thought and bring it under the control of the Holy Spirit“.
Do we do this as Christians? Many times we don’t do it immediately so we have to ask Jesus to forgive us and give us the strength to capture it quicker when it happens again. It will happen because not one of us is perfectly able to do this. Jesus did but He was totally submitted to His Father’s will for His life and there isn’t a person on Earth capable of doing that today. Some may think that they can do it but they are being deceived by Satan.
Each of the Ten Commandments has been broken by preachers, teachers, carpenters and shepherds all over this world. It doesn’t matter what your occupation is but if you consider yourself a Christian and your heart has been changed to the point that you don’t do the things that you used to do…you will still fail in some way. We are human. Yes our heart belongs to Jesus and we read and study God’s Word but our mind can be tricked so easily into thinking something or imagining something that we shouldn’t. It takes prayer, every day, and seeking Him more than just once or twice a week to be successful in your walk with Jesus.
I pray that whoever reads this short message will seek Him out and give their heart to Jesus. Ask Him to come into your life and change you so that your life will be useful to Him from that point on. Then your eternity is secure and your life can be more than it has ever been or even more than you could imagine.
Obligations
There was a workday at our church this past weekend but I couldn’t attend. The need for getting groceries early because of the heat and our lack of an air-conditioned vehicle seemed greater than the need for one more set of hands at our church. Yet, on Sunday morning I felt as if I didn’t belong there because I didn’t do my part the day before. I prayed for their safety in the heat and for our revival coming up but it still didn’t seem to be enough. Why?
The spirit of “guilt” was affecting my conscience I suppose. Nobody said anything to me about my absence but I still felt out of place. Was it Satan trying to get to me for not being there? It could’ve been.
In spite of our salvation, Satan can and does get into our heads and he can make us feel things that aren’t an issue as if they are. That is how he can split a church over trivial things that shouldn’t matter that much! Many times we make problems bigger when they shouldn’t be actual problems at all. That is his work. He tries to make our lives miserable even when we are serving the Lord. This is when we should recognize that he is behind it and just tell him to stay out of the way in the name of Jesus.
God carries us through each and every day whether they are good or bad days. Our problem is our own minds can and will listen to Satan’s lies making little things seem to be much bigger than they are. Seek to do the will of God on the good days and the bad days. Read His Word and learn of His Wisdom because your own wisdom can get you into trouble far quicker than you can imagine, especially with Satan’s help. If you think you are above listening to Satan, he will prove you wrong and in a big way. He can place thoughts in your mind that can cause you to think things that you wouldn’t otherwise, so be careful.
God loves each of us and He has given us a way to tap into His strength through the Holy Spirit but we have to initiate it through prayer and by knowing His Word well enough to use it for our defense. Read His Word each day, pray about what you have read and ask Him to give you His wisdom so that you can understand the meaning behind what you have read. It is our obligation to know His Word so that we know His voice when it speaks to us as we read it. It is our obligation to do what His Word commands us to do so that others will know about the Savior Who came to give each of us a chance at eternity. Make sure that you know Him and that He knows you before your time here is through.
