Category: Choose to follow Jesus Christ

Lost or found, which will it be?


How many people in our world seem to be lost in their ways and in their way of thinking? If you go by the uproar and tumult on the news it seems that there are more of those who are lost than those who are at least trying to do the will of God. Why do I bring this matter up in this writing? Because it seems necessary during this time that we are living in. Many need to know that there is a way to be useful and make a difference in this world without wars and guns and lots of money! Life is not supposed to be lived in the moment just for today and then seeking more satisfaction for tomorrow! If you are living in this manner then you are living only for yourself and not for the benefit of mankind. Although, today most people, it seems, are only in their respective professions or businesses for themselves and no one else. Selfishness or “looking out for number one” seems to be the very slogan by which the world lives and breathes today.

We are supposed to be different. Christians are supposed to live as Jesus did. Not living as a beggar with no money but living a life of service to our fellow man or woman. Although in the age in which we are living many people would look at someone doing this and wonder “What’s their problem?”. Christians who are trying to be “salt and light” to a world living in darkness and hopelessness tend to move against the grain because most people around them are moving in the other direction regardless of those that they are stepping on or over to get there. It is sad but it is true in our world. You’ve seen people on the news with their phones taking videos of someone after a wreck or a shooting. They aren’t trying to help them. They are trying to get more likes on Facebook or Instagram by posting their pictures or their videos of someone who has been injured or killed.

Are you one of those who would help someone in trouble or danger or would you take pictures and video their plight? Jesus said that we, as His followers, should make a difference in the world. But taking pictures and videos doesn’t really make a difference it just brings you notoriety and a little bit of fame. What good is that? Where is “make a difference in the world” in God’s Word? It isn’t there. But…He did tell His disciples to go into the world and take the gospel to the world! Did it make a difference? It still is making a difference today. God can and does change lives when we tell others about His Son and the salvation which comes through believing in Him! Don’t discount your importance in His Kingdom. Telling one or two people about your experience in Jesus and His love for you and for them and then they can tell five or ten. If you take that idea and make it go exponential, it wouldn’t take long to reach one hundred thousand or even one million.

This sounds hard doesn’t it? Not for God! God can use you in any place, anywhere so don’t discount your influence for God’s Kingdom because with the Holy Spirit impacting your life as a Christian and you following His leading go tell somebody!

Amen!

Have you been foolish?


Actually most of us have been at one time in our life. Just as it says in Corinthians: ‘a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him.’ (1 Corinthians 2:14). People who don’t know the grace of God or the mercy of God through the sacrifice and acceptance of Jesus as their Savior are foolish until that time when God, by the Holy Spirit, touches their heart and breaks it so that they realize their sinfulness. Every Christian has gone through some foolish times before they realized that Jesus was their Salvation.

God can and does get His message out into the world even without our help, but He calls us to be His voice in places where we can make a difference. Even if it is only to touch one person or maybe two. Some of us can reach more people by doing things like this. Some of us can do evangelism on a scale above what we can reach here but not in the league of some ministers. Sometimes we may only reach one person but you don’t know how many people that person will reach before their time is finished.

All of us are useful to God in telling others about our Savior…so why don’t we do more? Being foolish and following the world around us rather than following Jesus is spiritual suicide, maybe not in this life but in eternity. Unless you change and learn that your only eternal Savior is Jesus you will end up in the same place that Satan and his demons will be. Think about that and consider Who has given you the opportunity to make an eternal choice which will benefit you and give God the glory!

Salvation is through Jesus alone


Jesus said “I AM the way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the Father except through Me”. He is the Savior of the world, if you will accept Him as your Savior. I pray that you will not turn away from His call on your life because serving Jesus forever is better than life on this Earth. God has loved you since before the Light of Creation began to shine and He has known who you are and what you are destined to do. Obey His commandment and tell others what He has done for you because there are blessings which all of us receive each and every day because of His love for you. Amen

Growth with God’s blessing


Exponential growth works like this: 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512, 1024.

So why does a garden or a farm never produce like this? Is it because of our lack of faith in the One Who created everything? Do we look at our pitiful little plot of ground that we have and think that it will never produce for me like it did for my grandfather? Sometimes, we create our own “self-fulfilling prophecies” when we think that way.

Do you ever wonder why some farmers aren’t very successful and some are? Consider that the very idea of farming is based on faith. Cattle are born, pigs are born, chickens are born (from an egg), vegetables grow from seeds. All of these processes are miracles in one way or another. The success of any farm depends upon the faith of the person or persons who are involved in it. If you don’t have faith in God and the processes which He put in the world for our good and for the good of others, how will your business actually be successful? This applies to any business but especially to the life of a farmer of whatever kind of produce because He ordained “seedtime and harvest” in His Word.

He ordained it very early in His Word but His Word does not fall to the ground without accomplishing what He intended for it to accomplish. Farmers have faith in their farming practice because they are following the procedures that other farmers have done and it worked in the past. They should also have faith in the Creator of all because He created all of the animals and the seeds which are farmed and planted all over the world. Do I believe that all farmers have faith in God? I would say that most of them do. Some may have more faith in Roundup than they do in God, but God is still in control of every seed and every patch of ground. If your garden or your ranch is small or if it covers many thousands of acres, your faith in the One Who controls every aspect of growth regardless of the type of growth should be in proportion to how much you are placing in His hands.

God can cause all things to work together for the good of those who belong to Him and are called according to His purposes. When we are called to become children of God through Jesus, we must have faith in the One Who has saved us and the One Who has called us. 

If you are living according to His Ways, then your faith in Him will carry you through the problems and the blessings, whatever they may be, because He loves you and He will do that for you. Your farming will pay off and it will be successful in proportion to the amount of faith that you have in Him that He will do these things for you and for His glory. If we intentionally plant a garden to honor God with the produce of it and give Him the honor and the glory for its success then He has an interest in our garden and its success. But if we just throw some seed down and hope that He will bless us with enough rain and pray that the seed which we planted was good seed do you think it will be blessed? He might bless our efforts but He might not. We should seek to do His will in all of our endeavors whether it is farming, raising a family, or working in our business or for someone else. The only way to know His will for us is to read and study His Word and ask Him to show us His will for our life.

God brings the growth when we act on our faith in Him.

Cultivation for Life


In many ways, our lives are kinda like farming. We cultivate relationships and friendships and sometimes those turn into life-long, close relationships. It takes patience and effort though and occasionally we don’t take care of these very well. Many times in our lives, a lot of time will go by before we see each other or even speak to each other. It causes hurt feelings and bruised pride and can really damage a friendship…sometimes.

We really should try to put the effort into our relationships, whether they are friends or our spouse or even our family. But, sometimes we neglect to honor those with our time and our effort and when we do that, things change. Weeds will grow in our “garden of friends”. Sometimes we will see them and get rid of them before they cause problems. Sometimes they are aggressive and they have roots that go deep into our past and it is possible that we have forgotten what caused them in the first place.

Why do I speak about friendships and relationships like a garden? Because we should work on them like we would a garden. Make sure that the “soil” of our life is ready for a newly planted “friend” and then take care of them in whatever way is needed. Don’t neglect them because when you neglect a garden or a friendship, problems begin to appear. Weeds in a garden and hurt feelings in a relationship, whether it is between friends or in a closer relationship, they will grow and cause more problems.

That is the wonderful thing about your relationship with God and His Son, Jesus. They already know what is going on in your life. They aren’t surprised or hurt by what you say or don’t say. They can see the “problems” before they come up but they want us to recognize them and seek their help with those problems. Because they are better at fixing problems than we are. They know the cause and the fix before you or me. But just because they aren’t surprised by our problems doesn’t mean that they will try to force us to listen to their advice. We have to seek them out and ask for their help with our problems.

Sometimes it takes a problem coming into our lives to force us to seek God’s answer and His wisdom for this situation. We don’t like it when these problems show up and they usually are very inconvenient because of their timing but if we will seek God’s wisdom to get us through them one at a time, we will learn from them and be able to move forward. God always has better advice for us in His Word than we could ever find in a library or even from a friend if we will listen to the advice and take it to heart. 

Your life and mine are populated with many friends. Some we know only at work and some we’ve known since grammar school. Some are just acquaintances and some are very close friends. Sometimes the friendship might have become stale because of time or distance and that can happen to family relationships too. Make sure that your relationship with Jesus is not stale. Keep in touch with Him at all times and in all things, good or bad, because He will never leave you or forsake you regardless of the circumstances.

How unique are you?


Consider that God knitted your DNA together in the womb, there is not another person on Earth like you. Even if they are your twin, there is something unique about each of you that the other does not have. Why does God make each of us in this way? Because, it gives each of us those special and unique talents and abilities which makes each of us so useful to Him. In ways that we may not realize until He shows us what they are.

God loves each of us, whether we have given our hearts to Jesus or not. He has loved us this deeply since before creation. So make sure that you seek Him in all that you do when you feel His call on your life. Living in this world today we can see the evil around us all of the time. On the news, on the Internet, in newspapers and magazines. When I say evil I mean anything which does not acknowledge God as King and Jesus as Savior. If you listen to the words of those who want a socialist state you can tell that they do not revere God in any way except for thinking that they are “god”.

You are unique because God made you that way. Mom and Dad contributed some genetic material to your creation but God is the designer and He put the traits which He wanted you to have inside you. We are made in and carry God’s image in us. We are not gods but we are children of His, if we have given our hearts to Jesus and have been adopted into His family. If you don’t have Jesus as your Savior then you are no better than any other lost person in this world. But…if God has a special job for you to do He will make a way for you to come to Him as a saved and sanctified child adopted into His family. There is no power on Earth that can stop Him if He has determined that you are His!

God sent Jesus to be the sacrifice which paid for all of your sins and mine so that you can be adopted as sons into His family.

Inspirational Song For Today: Reckless Love With Cory Asbury — The Abuse Expose’ with Secret Angel


For all the broken out there, remember that God’s Reckless Love will chase us down and fight till we’re found!! He does not want to leave anyone behind.

Inspirational Song For Today: Reckless Love With Cory Asbury — The Abuse Expose’ with Secret Angel

Friends…


Are you a friend to somebody? Do you have many friends that you actually know? Or are you more like me, you have friends that you have known for a long time but life and distance keep you from seeing each other? Many of us are in the same place that I am. We do have friends and have had some for many years but circumstances and distance tend to make the relationship kinda hard to keep alive. Even my relationship with some of my family is tempered by distance and our ability to bridge that distance is tempered by money and time as well.

In many ways, our relationship with Jesus sometimes falls into this same rut. We get caught up in life and our own problems and we push our time with Jesus and His Word to the back of our priority list. Then, sometimes, it gets pushed a little bit more. Then one day we realize that we truly miss our relationship with our Savior and we come back to Him apologizing for being away for so long. Why? Because it was us who moved, Jesus has always been near us. If we are Christians, His Spirit is still there even if we aren’t paying any attention to Him. This happens more often than we would like to admit…to anyone.

Sometimes we get a bit too open with our words and our “opinions” and we hurt each other’s feelings. Sometimes I feel like we do the same thing to Jesus as well, but He forgives us even when we do it more than we should. The best thing that we can remember about friendships is: don’t treat your regular friends like you treat Jesus. Because we take Him for granted all of the time and we should never take our friends for granted. God gave us friends to be there when we need them because until He comes to rule this Earth He isn’t physically here. So our friends are there to be “stand-ins” for Him.

Make sure which friends you have and always treasure their friendship like you would a brother or a sister because in Christ we are all brothers and sisters.

Wisdom comes from God


It seems that many people place their “faith” in books and degrees and they seem to think that the wisdom that they have came from those achievements. Some of it did, at least the mankind of wisdom comes from books and degrees. But what about your common sense? What about the value and wisdom which comes from reading God’s Word?

I’ve heard that there are some who seem to be lacking in the “common sense” department but have you ever thought that their version of common sense may just be different from yours? It may not be the same or work in the same fashion as yours does but it is likely that they have a special case of common sense which fits their position and purpose in this life. Why do I say this? Because God is the One Who gives out “common sense” and I don’t think He makes mistakes.

There are too many physical properties of our universe which have to be so in tune for life to exist to say that God could make a mistake like not giving someone any common sense. He doesn’t make mistakes. But, we seem to want Him to be more like us instead of the other way around. I don’t want God to be like us at all! If He were like us, I’m sure we would not be here!

All of the wisdom in the world was given to us from God. I don’t think that He quit speaking through people just because it isn’t canonized and included in the Bible. What about all of the Christian literature which has His wisdom included in it? True, some of the inclusions are direct quotes from the Bible but there is other wisdom in those books which did not come from the Bible and it is just as wise and true as if Paul wrote it. Do we look down on it because it is “man’s” wisdom rather than from God? How do you know that the Holy Spirit didn’t inspire them to write it? He could be giving me these words too and frankly, I think He always has because I’ve never been a person who talks a lot.

Writing here is my witness to others who may never get to a Christian church and I stand by that conviction. I do believe that the Holy Spirit gives me the words to say here, so please take the time to read His wisdom in these words because I’m not trying to convince you of anything other than the fact that Jesus is the Christ and He is the only Savior Who can save you from your sins and pardon you so you can enter into eternity with Him.

Why did Jesus go up to Jerusalem?


On the last Passover that Jesus celebrated with His disciples, He knew what would happen soon. His Spirit knew what was being planned for Him. So why did He go there? You know that if it were you or me, our fear of death would’ve kept us away from that place. Jesus was as much human as we are, but He was also God and He knew that if He didn’t go and fulfill the Father’s will mankind would have no part in His Kingdom when it’s time is fulfilled.

So, why did Jesus go to Jerusalem that night? Because of His love for mankind, not just for the Jewish people but for all of humanity. God did this because He knew that we could not have a relationship with Him unless our sin debt had been paid fully and only Jesus could do that. The blood of bulls and lambs and goats could only atone temporarily for our sins as it did in the Old Testament, but the New Testament in Jesus’ blood is a permanent atonement for our sins if we will believe in Him for our salvation. That is the only requirement that we have to fulfill for our salvation and it is our belief which comes to us through the faith which is given to us also by God. We cannot choose to come to Him on our own but when we feel our broken state and know that we need Him, then we can cry out to Him and He will heal us by the blood of Jesus.

You may wonder why I said in the paragraph above that He will heal you by the blood of Jesus. We are under a curse of sin and before Jesus comes into our heart we are dead spiritually. It is this spiritual death which Jesus heals us of and quickens us by His Spirit to do His will for the rest of our days. God loves you and has always loved you. The only requirement for your salvation that you can accomplish is to respond to the Spirit of God which breaks your heart to bring you to the point of repentance knowing that you need Jesus as your Savior.

God sent His Son to bring salvation to Judea but since they refused to believe that He was the Christ, the world gained a Savior. Believe in Him for your salvation because it is found in no other. Salvation is by the grace of God given to us through Jesus and by Him only.