Who is in charge?

In our society today even those who are supposed to be in charge have doubts about who is really in charge. Some aren’t sure of their ability. Some are blocked from doing what needs to be done by those who want to see them fail. Some people just want to find someone to blame for their problems and they don’t care what they do or say about someone to switch the blame to someone else. In our country and our world at large it seems that nobody acknowledges that God is really the One Who is in charge.

In Colossians chapter 1 Paul writes this: 16 For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. 17 He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

Our Creator, Redeemer and Savior is God and also Jesus Christ in whom we live and have our life now and into eternity. If you have given your life to Jesus and follow Him then your Spirit lives in Him and through Him. God’s love for us and especially the Jewish people is a love which cannot be measured by any human measure. We cannot understand it. He is above us and yet when Jesus came to live among us, He personally lived as a man so that He would know our weakness and our frailties and would be able to identify with each of us in a personal way.

Some people foolishly think that we are able to “rise above the human condition” with no help from anyone. If you look at the history of every country in the world, you can see that it just doesn’t work that way. It doesn’t matter what political system is involved, mankind will be the animal that we think he is. While it is true that humanity can be and do good things for a while, historically it won’t last very long.

We can be more like Jesus Christ if we live according to His Word and teachings. The Holy Spirit comes into your heart and changes your “condition” so that we are able to rise above but we must live in His Word. Reading it, studying it, praying about it and what we can do through Him to be more like Him. Without the Holy Spirit we can do nothing. Our “natural inclination” is to be selfish and seek pleasure for our own purposes and do whatever it takes to “get ahead” in life. But by reading and studying God’s Word, not man’s rules and ideas, we can move toward being better than we could be on our own IF the Holy Spirit is allowed to work in and through us.

Don’t be the animal that “evolution” says that we are. God did not design us by using an ape, we are made in God’s image! More people need to see Jesus in and through our actions and our lives so that they will want to know Him too. The future of humanity is written in God’s Word and we should be living through Jesus and He should be working through us to bring the whole world into the future that God has prepared for it.

What makes the difference?

What makes a difference in a person’s life? I don’t mean materially like having a lot of money, what I am speaking of is an eternal difference. Now, there are some in our country today who would ask, “What do you mean “eternal difference”? Well, according to God’s Word which, isn’t read very much in America anymore, all of us have an eternity to look forward to after we die. Some of us won’t like it there at all. They will see their eternity as a punishment and a prison. Well, it is.

You see when you live your life like the devil then your eternity will be to live in eternity with the devil. Now during this life, I have heard many people say that in hell we will be having a party all through eternity. But that is not the way Jesus describes hell. He said the smoke of their torment rises for eternity and that they will be thrown into the lake of fire with Satan and his demons. A lake of fire doesn’t sound like a party to me. Especially when your eternal body is capable of feeling pain even though the lake of fire can’t kill you.

The difference that we make in other lives and in our own life can only come by one Person, Jesus Christ. He is the Author and the Finisher of our faith and it is His Spirit which remakes us into a child of God. We cannot do this transformation on our own. There is no amount of money or time or work, which will miraculously make us righteous in the sight of God. Only belief in the Son, Jesus Christ for our salvation will accomplish this task. We do not choose this on our own because even when you have been in a revival tent or meeting if you feel that you need Jesus and you go down front that decision may be because of your friends going down or some girl going down.

When the Holy Spirit touches your heart and breaks it so that you know that you need Jesus regardless of who may see you or what your friends might say. Nothing will keep you from going down and making Him your Savior. God’s Holy Spirit will move you to make that decision and you will make it. Sometimes it may take a few more prompting touches from Him but you will get down on your knees and give your life to Jesus.

What does all of this have to do with making a difference? Because others will see the difference in you and they will want to know what happened? Your life and your way of living changed and someone will want to know how they can have the peace that you have. They will hear about your life turning in the opposite direction from where you were headed and they will see a difference in you. Some may not see it as a good thing and that’s okay but there will be others who see the change and they will want what you have found.

When your life changes like that then you will make a difference in someone’s life. Maybe even more than one person. Then they can go out and make a difference and the effect will keep going from there. God can make one person…one seed sprout into a field of new growth for His Kingdom. It only takes a spark to start a fire if the right kind of wood is there. Your “spark” comes from the Holy Spirit and the fire that He starts in your heart is what other people see. Once they see this change in your life, they will want to know what or Who it is that made this change.

Make sure that they know it was Jesus Christ Who brought you to this place in your life.

Endless love for…

We have heard songs for this and we’ve prayed for it to happen to us but until you realize that you already have it…it never really sinks into your conscience. God has loved every one of us since before the first blade of grass grew in Eden. He has known our weaknesses and our strengths and where and when we would make mistakes and He loves us anyway. Even when we refuse to listen to Him or we turn away from Him for a time and do our own thing…He still loves us. Feeling loved or unloved? Seek God in the Psalms and Proverbs. His love shines so bright that our own Sun cannot be bright enough to make a shadow.

Endless love. The kind of love that lasts not just for a lifetime but for eternity is the love that God has always had for each of us. Will He show this love to us while we are still alive? Yes, and He does it every time you wake up to a new day. When your day goes your way until you get home that was God making your day smooth and productive. God’s Spirit comes to live with you when you accept Jesus as your Savior and He is with you during the good days and the bad ones. He is never any further from you than a breath and a prayer. If you are hurting, the Holy Spirit can fill in the blanks that you can’t pray because of grief or the loss of a loved one. He knows your pain but He will give you the strength to get through it today and tomorrow and the next day too.

The gifts which the Spirit brings to your life will help with so much and add to your life and your enjoyment of it. God does so much for us each day and most of it goes unnoticed because He takes care of little things before they become big ones. Sometimes we ask Him to do something for us and He knows that we don’t need it or that it would cause problems for us later. He answers those prayers by not answering them. We don’t understand His logic but we aren’t supposed to understand Him. He’s God our Savior, our Protector, our Creator and our Redeemer. What more could you want or need?

God watches over the righteous

For the eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and his ears are open unto their prayers: but the face of the Lord is against them that do evil. 1 Peter 3:12 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/1pe.3.12.KJV

When you pray, God hears your prayers. If you are a sinner, the only prayer that He will hear is your prayer for forgiveness and repentance. After that, He will be near you every step of the way. God never turns away from a sinner if they are sincere about turning away from their sins. Only a prayer for forgiveness and repentance from a sinner will be answered instantly, if it is sincere. Just like trying to quit smoking or drinking will not work unless you truly mean it. God knows what is in your heart and He knows what you are thinking. It cannot be hidden from Him.

God does care about and He watches over all of us, sinner and saint alike, and His will for all will be accomplished because His will cannot be undone. The world around us thinks that they can change the future by their actions but the future is in God’s hands and it will happen the way that He says it will in His Word. Look to His Word for your peace and your salvation through Jesus Christ.

Are you following Jesus?

When Jesus called His disciples, He asked them to follow Him and they did. Some of them learned a lot from following Him and listening to His teachings. One of them was dissatisfied with how things were going. He wanted a King for Israel and one who would defeat the Romans and push them out of Israel. But…that was not the reason for Jesus’ mission at the time.

So, are you following Jesus or are you hearing the preacher tell you about Him and then going your own way? Believe it or not, there are more people who are in church just listening than there are who are following Jesus every day and every step of the way. Some who read this will want to know how to follow Jesus every step of the way and here’s the answer: read the Bible each day, praying that He will speak to you about your day and your problems.

God will do that if you are serious about reading it and learning from it exactly Who He is and His love for you. Even if you only read a chapter each day it will focus your thoughts on Him and you will have those Scriptures to help you in your time of need. The thing is: when you read God’s Word, the Holy Spirit can and will speak to you through it. You will never read the same verse twice and get the same message. It will always be a different more useful message even if you’ve read it 100 times!

Walking with Jesus is the same today as it was when the disciples walked with Him. Get up from your bed and thank Him for giving you one more day to live and learn from Him. Go through your day thanking Him for even the little things which seem insignificant but they touch your life or your thoughts in some way. Thank Him for your food and your job and the ride home. Be in a worshipful mood of thankfulness all day because He has given you this day to learn from Him. Thank Him for your day before you go to bed and thank Him for a home to sleep comfortably in because there are so many who don’t have even that “luxury”.

Make this a daily habit and your life will be so much more complete and secure.

When trials come…

There is a reason that I put this in the title. Because all of us have trials. Some are good and some are not so good. Some of them sneak up on us and some we have been living with for a while.

What should you do when trials come? Pray. If you aren’t a believer you need to ask Jesus to be your Lord and Savior because that is the most important prayer that each of us needs to pray. Then pray for your country. If you live here in America, it needs prayer and I mean a LOT of prayer! If you live outside of America, you know what you need to pray for in your country. Because there are so many problems and trials it is hard to know exactly what to pray for or even how to pray for it. That is why you need to ask Jesus to be your Savior. When you do that, you will receive the Holy Spirit and even when you don’t know what to pray for or even how to pray, He can pray for you and let the Father know what is needed.

Trials will come, to Christians and non-believers as well. Just as it rains on the just and the unjust, trials come to all of us. Prayer is what is needed for all things. For your health, for your salvation, for your family and for your country’s leaders. God is interested in all of this and in each of us but many of us don’t believe that He cares about our lives. God has always cared about us and our world. Our problem is that we can’t or won’t believe in Him because many people in the world deny His existence. They don’t believe the Word and His book, the Bible or they pick and choose what they will believe and what they will not.

The problem with picking and choosing to believe parts of God’s Word or not is that you are calling God a liar. His Spirit inspired every word and promise in the Bible. There is no reason not to believe what He says and Who He is, unless you just don’t believe in God or Jesus Christ at all. When I think of someone who is in this state of mind, I truly feel pity for them. Because if you don’t change your mind and seek Him and ask forgiveness…you will have an eternity separated from Him to realize that you had the ability to be in His Presence with one decision.

Our trials in this life are small compared to much of the world around us. Truly, worrying about the injustices in this world is the least of our troubles. Your life and mine are only a puff of smoke compared to eternity. Make sure of your destination after this life because you will have a lot more time after death to either enjoy Life with Jesus or the feeling of death outside of His Presence in hell.

You have led captivity captive

Psalm 68:18 Thou hast led captivity captive; thou hast received gifts for men; yea, for the rebellious also, that the Lord God might dwell among them.

What did the Psalmist and the Holy Spirit mean by this scripture? One of the interpretations is that the whole world was and is still captive to sin in this world today, but when Jesus Christ came He made it possible for us to be led from the captivity of sinful living and into the “captive” life of a follower and believer in Him. That is the one that I choose to believe today.

Today, there are many of us that are captive to many things in life. Our work, our family, our TV or the Internet, our children or grandchildren and sometimes we are captive to bills that need paying even into our retirement years. It seems that we never get away from something that keeps us as “slaves” to whatever it may be. Even when we give our lives and our heart to Jesus there are certain things which we refuse to give to Him because those are special to us and we want them just for us.

It is usually those special things which cause us to fail at being His servant or His voice in the world. Because of those things that we don’t want to give up or give to Him, we can’t or won’t completely give our life and our being over to Him. It doesn’t take much really. A small part of your life that is important to you, that you want to keep doing or working on yourself but you don’t want God to have it. Have you ever thought about the truth of this matter: you have things which belonged to God first and He gave them to you.

Think about it. Abraham had to face it and many others did as well. Moses followed God and obeyed Him so that the nation of Israel was born out of Egypt. Moses had to go through all sorts of trials and tribulations for forty years because of the Jews decision not to believe God. In order to be obedient to God we should give Him ALL of our being and our family and our possessions because they were His before they were ours.

God loves all of humanity. Regardless of your nationality or your skin color or your culture. He created this world so that we could have a place to live. He named all of the stars and placed them where they are so that we can look up at them and see His handiwork and believe in Him. Our real problem is that many people will worship the creation rather than the Creator. We walk proudly through our life and tell Jesus that we can guide our life just fine on our own. But when a true problem comes along that we cannot handle such as a deadly accident or a diagnosis of cancer or some other disease….that is usually when we run to the Savior and plead with Him to help you with it.

Won’t you decide to follow Him today and give your life to Jesus? If you have ever felt the touch of His Holy Spirit prompting you to come to know Him please don’t turn away from His call. Because not one of us knows when our last day of life will be and we need to have the assurance that our eternal destiny will be with Jesus Christ. Just the knowledge of that assurance will relieve many anxieties and fears for many of us. God doesn’t want you to spend eternity in hell away from His Presence so please make sure that your heart belongs to Him today. I will be praying for all who come to this blog because God has asked me to. Thank you for reading and if you know someone who might benefit from this site please direct them here.

Seek and you shall find…Him

Some people wonder where they might find the Truth of Jesus…but will you believe in Him? Some may ask why should I believe in Him? You can choose not to if you wish but that choice will impact your eternity. Why not seek Jesus and the Truth of God’s plan for salvation? It takes faith and the will to believe even when others don’t want to. There are so many choices today, so which will you choose?

We believe in entertainers, professional athletes, money, position, power, money, but none of these can bring you salvation. Regardless of how much money or power or position you may have, when you die it means nothing. Not one penny of your fortune or any part of your fortune goes with you after you breathe your last breath. But if you have faith in Jesus and believe that He is the Son of God Who died for your sins then you will have eternal life with Him! What kind of price could you place on that promise? It is given to you freely and without cost. For the price of your faith and your belief in Him you get a prize which no one on Earth can give you at any cost!

But many people today are burning God’s Word, the Bible, which teaches about Him and how we might come to know Him. They don’t want the good news which is found in its pages. They are afraid of its Truth and all of the wisdom that is in its pages for anyone to read and believe.

Why are they afraid?

Because God’s Word is more powerful than anything that mankind has ever done and all you have to do is have faith and believe in Jesus to claim it. Consider for a moment…the most powerful bomb that we have created. I’m not speaking of the bombs dropped during World War 2. I am speaking of the hydrogen bombs which, thankfully no one in their right mind would drop. The ones dropped in Japan were rated in the kiloton range, meaning that they were equivalent to about ten thousand pounds of TNT each. The hydrogen bombs which we have today are equivalent to millions of pounds of TNT each.

God created stars which put out that much power in one second! Our own star puts out that kind of power in one second and it is considered a dwarf star! It is only approximately 900,000 miles across and there are stars out there that God created which make our Sun look like the Earth next to them in size. Yet with all of His power and majesty and wisdom creating everything that is in this VAST universe, God still knows how many hairs are on your head and mine and everyone else around you. He even notices when a sparrow dies and falls to the ground. Why?

Because He is God, Jesus is also God and the Holy Spirit is also God. Three distinct Persons of the Trinity but still God. The Spirit moves us to know that we are sinners in need of salvation and gives us faith to act on that to seek out our Savior which is Jesus the Son so that we can be reconciled to God the Father

We try to put God in a box of our own choosing so that we can relate to Him. That is why you hear some people say that “my god would not be so cruel” or “my god understands me and we have an arrangement”. Satan has convinced them that they can do this and god will understand when we go fishing or hunting or stay home to watch the ball game. Because they claim that “I can worship from my living room or from a boat or my tree stand”. Have you ever praised God from your boat or a tree stand? I’ve never heard songs of praise or prayers in the woods during deer season. Unless they were something like “Lord, let me get that BIG buck and I’ll be in church every Sunday”.

You can’t bargain with God like that! He knows your heart and He knows exactly where you will be next Sunday and it won’t likely be in His house.

Jesus said:

Ask, Seek, Knock

(Luke 11:5-13)

7 Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: 8 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. 9 Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? 10 Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? 11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?

12 Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets.

Consider the heat…

In the South, we live in a very humid area of the country especially during the summer. High pressure “cells” come through our area of the country at least once or twice every month. They begin well at times but when we get behind the high pressure “cell” it pushes humidity and warm air from the Gulf of Mexico up into Mississippi, Louisiana and Alabama and parts of Texas too. Many of us have heard the saying about the heat in the Southwest “but its a dry heat”. Going from our state to Arizona is a wake-up call for sure but 110 degrees is HOT whether it is dry or humid although humidity would make that temperature nearly unbearable.

Why am I speaking about heat and the heat of summer to be specific? Because…hell is HOT and it could be a “dry heat” but an eternity there is not what most people think of when they hear about hell. Dry or not, we don’t know what temperature hell is and the lake of fire brings up images of the inside of a volcano to me. So consider this…all unbelievers and Satan and his demons will be cast into the lake of fire. Most people think that it doesn’t sound bad but people in hell will have eternal bodies. The kind of body which doesn’t die regardless of your circumstances but it will be able to experience pain

Being cast into a volcano in our body that we have here on Earth will be painful for only a few seconds. An eternal body that is cast into the lake of fire will live in the fire and pain forever. An immortal body will heal if it is hurt, whether from a gunshot or from thousands of degrees of lava. This place was not created by God for humanity. It was created for Satan and his demons but when we rebel and decide to live our life without God or Jesus as our example for living we are siding with Satan whether we worship him or not. Even if you go to church and “act” like a Christian for most of your life, thinking that you will get into Heaven because of your “righteousness” you are wrong!

The heat that we feel in the Southeast is nothing compared to hell and the fact that we will go to hell because we have rejected the offer of eternity by rejecting Jesus as our Savior just makes the lie that we believed even worse. Living our short lives here in the humidity and heat of summer is child’s play compared to the eternity that you will live in hell because you rejected Jesus as your Savior.

Remember the man who asked Jesus to “remember me when you come into your Kingdom”? Jesus told him that he would be in Paradise that day for the simple act of believing in Jesus and Who He was. He is at the right hand of the Father now waiting for God to tell Him to bring the church up there.

God is always near

Psalm 46: 1 “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.”

Many people think that the other phrase, “God helps those who help themselves”, is in the Bible but it isn’t. It sounds good but the phrase about God being a helper and being with you in troubled times is the one found in Psalm 46. This is not the only one which tells of His ability to help us when we are in need but it is very true that He is and He will if we will call on Him.

It doesn’t matter what sort of trouble you may be in or how you got into such trouble, if you are a child of God and have faith in Jesus as your Savior He is always with you.

Why do I bring this up now? Because of all of the problems and pain that our country and our world is going through right now. The pandemic of this “new” disease which is even less deadly than the flu and it seems to be the most important disease at the moment. Jesus told His disciples that when He went to be with His Father He would send the Helper (Holy Spirit) to teach them and testify of His message in their lives and their ministry. Every Christian has this Helper living on the inside of them and He is always present in every area of our life whether we are going through something good or bad.

Even when we can’t think of the words to pray with, He is praying directly to the Father for us in words which express exactly what the problem is and the urgency of it. The Holy Spirit is our Teacher, our Helper, and our Voice when we are too emotional or maybe too sick or hurt to pray for our problem. That is why Jesus asked the Father to send Him and when you become a Christian, He comes to live in your heart.

When Jesus was baptized by His cousin, John, all three Persons of the Godhead were there. Jesus was there in His humanity, God spoke to those who could hear and the Holy Spirit came and stayed on Jesus in the form of a dove. So truly we do have “God with us” every day that we live after we become a Christian. I pray that whoever reads this will seek to learn about Jesus and His message, seek Him as your Savior and then live every day as if you are walking by His side because once you have accepted Him as your Savior there is a part of Him living within you from that day forward.