Category: God’s Love for us

How many times?


There are riots in the streets over a decision by some legal entity in our society, yet those riots will not change the outcome. The killing of people and burning of businesses and cars only makes the so-called “racial” issue more loaded, more explosive. During a time when the only real racist people are those who lived through it in the sixties and seventies!

Most of the young people in college now and those who may be a little beyond college age, don’t really recognize race as a problem or even a factor in their friendships or relationships. Why should our country keep on digging up the bones of a dead issue? Let it stay buried and move on, please! How do you think that God would act in this instance?

Not with violence or hatred, those are human emotions. Jesus got angry in the Temple, but that is because they had turned the outer court of the Temple into a marketplace and that was not what it was intended to be. Anger, hatred toward your fellow-man, is considered as murder in God’s eyes because the feelings which come out when you act and feel this way toward someone are very violent and just by thinking of the act in your mind you have committed it in your heart, whether you did so physically or not.

Our country and its people need to get back into church, soon, because we NEED God in our hearts and in this nation desperately! We have been pushing Him out of our lives for long enough and it is time that we got on our knees and begged for His forgiveness! Ask Him to come into your heart and cleanse your life and bring you back into a relationship with Him!

We can’t keep this kind of tension in our country because soon it could escalate into a real conflict between races and cultures, essentially another civil war of unrest and hatred and I don’t think that our nation could survive that at all. It would rip this nation apart and America would no longer be a nation, although I can’t imagine what is would become and I really don’t want to.

Please, get into a Bible teaching church, read and study God’s Word and ask Him to show you what He wants from your life and mine. We can’t wait for another “great awakening”, we have to wake up NOW! Before it is too late!

Life is tough, be tougher!


People who are survivors live through things that many of us would cringe at, accidents, war injuries, PTSD, cancer and chemotherapy, the list could go on and on.

My nephew is living proof of this and I feel that it is my duty to tell what I know of his story, at least to a certain point at least.

He was hurt in a four-wheeler accident about a month ago. He and two other boys were on the four-wheeler, which is not a good way to ride anyway, but they were being boys! Anyway, to make a very long story a bit shorter, a truck went to pass by them on the road and the driver of the four-wheeler decided that they should come back up on the road and they ended up in front of the truck. All three boys were hurt, but my nephew was hurt the worst, physically. He is still recovering in the hospital and he has only been in a room for about a week, the first three weeks he was in intensive care. He is strong, in his will and in his body, but it is God and many, many prayers that has brought him this far.

God has a plan for him…He has something to do in God’s Kingdom. I don’t know what yet, he doesn’t know what it is yet, but I hope that when he comes through this, he will find that purpose. I am not going to post pictures from his wreck or his recovery here, but I am placing a link to his prayer page on Facebook. If you wish to help in any way please visit this page. His family will need as much help financially as they can get due to the cost of the treatment that he has already had, but he will be going through therapy for the next year or so. Please, pray for him and if you feel that you can or should help contact them through this page.

He needs medical help, but God is in the help that he is getting. The doctors have been impressed with his progress, but I am not sure that they realize Who was doing the healing because it really is God working through them! According to the news that I got on the night that he had the wreck, the paramedics had to bring him back once or twice before they even made it to the hospital by helicopter. Our God is awesome and He is able to do exceedingly above what we think can be done in ANY situation.

I am not writing this to beg for money for my brother-in-law’s family, although the bills have already started coming in. I am writing this to let people outside of Facebook know that God is awesome and He still heals people today! They had to remove part of my nephew’s skull to relieve the pressure on his brain, although there is no brain damage today. As I said earlier, God has been guiding the doctor’s hands and their treatment of this young man, he is only thirteen years old.

Life is tough, and it is fleeting, his life could’ve been over that night if there had not been a helicopter team able to come pick him up. The other boys lives could have been taken, but they weren’t because God intervened in their lives at that time. I know that some won’t see it that way, but it is true! Even the person driving the truck was not at fault, because God had a plan and a purpose for this to happen. We may not know what His plan is yet, but He will bring it about one day.

Live your life for God. Wake up to know Him, read His Word, pray to Him to give you the understanding of His Word, because He is the only One Who is truly in control of this world, and the people living here and their lives, whether they have given their life to Him yet or not. God loved us enough that He sent His Son, Jesus, to die for us and to bring salvation to us, all that we have to do is claim it and realize that we can’t do anything to make our lives better, but He can.

Listen….


Have you heard from the Word of God lately? Many people don’t want to hear someone preaching from the Word because it is God’s Truth. Some don’t think that it is true or that it is God’s Word, they think that the Bible is just a book of stuff, stories made up by some bunch of old guys which tell a little about historical figures and some of them are good stories but that is it, nothing more. Have you ever really listened to it, really sat down and read it? The Bible is about much more than Jewish history and the kings which ruled Israel, it is a condensed history of the world itself, from the viewpoint of God’s chosen people.

Why did God choose the Jewish people? I don’t know, ask Him? The Word of God is living and alive because when you read it with faith and pray for understanding, it doesn’t matter how many times you read it…you will find something new, even in the same passage or chapter. If you can read it with no faith, just as a book and nothing more and it doesn’t have any effect on your soul or your life, then I feel sorry for you. I pray that a sermon from the Bible will touch your heart, that a verse will open your eyes and prick your soul to want to know the God of the Bible and His Son.

The time that has been foretold in Revelation is coming soon, whether you believe it or not. This generation will see it, will experience it in one way or another. The message that is contained within the Bible is one which points you to Jesus and to His saving of our souls through His sacrifice of Himself on the cross. He did it out of love for us, all of us, not just because He had to but because He wanted to do it. We are all loved by God but our sins are not and that is what Jesus came to save us from, our sinful nature, our rebellious nature, the one that says “Yeah, I know you said that I shouldn’t do this, but I am going to do it anyway.”

If we could just get our “buts” out-of-the-way and out of our life as we go through it, knowing what we should and shouldn’t do “but”….if we could just stop injecting that part of us into the equation of our lives then we would be so much better off. But…that is our nature, it is just us being human, being the people who God made us to be. Except, He didn’t make mankind to be that way, it happened when sin entered into the world that God had made. Yes, there are many truths found in the Bible, in God’s Word if we will read it and learn from it.

Allow yourself to hear the Word at a church, read from God’s Word and pray that God will show you the wisdom that He has for you, don’t close your mind to His Wisdom. He loves you for who you are in Christ, not your sinful lifestyle. If you feel His call on your heart, answer it and tell Him that you need Him in your life because you can’t do it on your own. Seek Him and His Kingdom through the study of the Bible. He will come into your life and change it into what it is supposed to be.

 

No matter what happens….


God is always by your side and He knows where you are, in whatever situation that you might find yourself. He is our Creator and protector and our Rock, all that we have to do is allow Him into our lives, daily, and He can show us what we have in Him and who we are in His eyes.

GodknowswhereyouareGod loves each one of us, no matter what we may have done or how bad we think we are, because He knows the person that you can be in Him. Christ died so that you can have life, abundant and full, in the joy of knowing that you are His when you decide to make Jesus your Savior. I know, that is not theologically correct, God has to call you first and you will know when that call is placed on your heart. You can’t just decide on your own that you are going to become a Christian, any more than you can change your old car into a new one by deciding to do so.

God knows you, better than you know yourself, and He will draw you to Himself so that you can be a saint in His Kingdom and His family. You don’t have to do anything to attain this position, because Jesus has already done all of the work, you just have to believe that He did it for you. In the days that seem like they will never end and the nights which seem to be so lonesome, God is there. He never leaves your side and will never leave your side, regardless of the circumstances in your life. Ask Him to share your life with you and to be your Savior and He will be!

We were created for fellowship with God, but you can’t have fellowship with Him without a relationship. God never leaves any of us, He is always closer than anyone and He can help you in all situations, but He will not force Himself on you or into your life, you have to ask Him to come into your life…into your heart and change you into the person that He already knows that you can be. Be that person for Him and for your life with Him, because without Him we are nothing, with Him we are and have everything!

Honor, Dignity, and Commitment


The character of our nation’s heroes, its Veterans, is uncompromising commitment to their job, their duty, and to their country. We honor their commitment with dignity on this Veteran’s Day, but what about our commitment? Do each of us have a commitment that we are duty bound to honor and carry through? We all should honor our elders, our parents and grandparents but especially our Veterans, whether they are veterans of a branch of the military or of the police service or fire and ambulance services, we should honor them. Why should we honor people who aren’t putting their lives on the line for our freedom? Because they actually do put their lives on the line, every day. When a police person (man or woman), puts that uniform on, it means that they are taking their lives and putting them on the line, not just for a pay-check (which isn’t much actually) but they are putting themselves in harm’s way for us, each of us, every day. Yes, Veterans do the same thing in the line of fire on a battlefield wherever they are sent to defend our freedoms and the freedom of the people that they are sent to protect. The same is true for ambulance personnel or fire service personnel, they put their lives in the line of traffic, or in the heat of a burning house or apartment building whenever they are on their jobs. So, they are all veterans of their respective service, regardless of the field that it may be in.

The same can be said about Jesus and His disciples. They put their lives on the line for their beliefs and for the cause of Christianity, to further the Kingdom of God around the world. We are to do the same, if we are committed to the cause of Christ, to take the knowledge of Jesus to all nations and people. We are also in a battle against Satan and his forces of spiritual beings, demons, principalities and powers which we cannot see, but they are in the world fighting against us and God. They are trying to keep people away from Jesus and the knowledge of Him and His grace toward us. Our fight is with those enemies which we can’t see, but they are there regardless and they will try any form of deception to win their cause, any lie, any death that they can cause to bring our voice down to silence. This is the enemy that we fight as Christians, the ones that can take our loved ones from us and ruin our witness to others if we allow it to happen, if we give in to their forces.

But, we can’t and we mustn’t give in or give up. The time is growing short and the battle lines are being drawn. We have to stand in our faith, we have to learn from Jesus what it takes to be still and know that God is with us and that He is far more powerful than the enemy that we face here on Earth. The victory is already ours through Christ, all that we have to do is claim it in faith by His power and His name. Stand in honor and dignity and commit yourself to Jesus’ cause and ask Him to give you the strength to commit to His cause and to stick with it until the end. God loves you and will give you the victory in all things if you will only believe in Jesus and the sacrifice that He made for you.

Semper Fi!  Praise the Lord! Come Lord Jesus!! Amen.

New hope for the future


The election has fostered hope in our government and in the future of America, but it is likely that it is a false hope. Oh, yes, the promises that were made in order to get the votes are high and grand, but are they real and doable…hardly. In the climate that our lawmakers find themselves in during this administration, few if any of the promises that were made will make it to a committee, let alone a vote. Then there is the chance of a veto as well, so the newly elected will not likely to make any real progress at all.

I don’t want to seem to be down on our President. I am glad that I have lived in a time that we could elect an African-American president because it is something that I didn’t think I would ever see. What has been done to our economy is tragic, but I fear that it really isn’t the President’s fault at all. It is the fault of our country and the people who have been pushing God and Christianity out of our culture and our schools and especially out of any government sponsored event or office.

Our nation was founded by God-fearing men and women and it is time that we accepted it as fact and got back to the God of our forefathers in truth and in our schools. In all honesty, if you don’t want your child or children to learn of God and what He has blessed us with, school your children at home and let the majority of children learn of our Creator and the blessings that we have enjoyed because of His grace toward us. He didn’t condone the slave trade that occurred three or four hundred years ago when it started in Africa and in Ireland, but it happened and brought many people to Christ anyway.

Right now, I am schooling my child at home because I want him to learn about God and His grace toward us and in the history of our country. I have to do this because of cost and because it isn’t allowed in public schools today like it was in my parent’s lifetime and their parent’s schools too. Our country was better off when God was part of the curriculum and not considered part of the “problem”. The problem is that many people, Christians, have not stood up to the minority who scream the loudest saying that our religion is harming their kids. How can learning of God and His love for you and your children harm them? Would you rather learn of Satan and his “rewards”? How about Buddhism and it’s rewards?

The only way to be blessed with an eternity that is meaningful is to follow Jesus and learn from the Bible, God’s Word and Wisdom. No other “religion” can gain you access into Heaven, only through the gates of hell and Satan would be tickled to death if he could get you to follow him there if only because he deprived you of a place in Heaven!

In the beginning paragraphs, I said that our problem in this country and its economic woes did not start with our President and it didn’t. Many of our policies concerning the secularization of America began before he was ever born and we began reaping the consequences of those actions long before he became President.

A revival is needed in our country and in every person’s life and if not revival, then salvation through Jesus. This is the only way of actually saving our country and no elected official can do it, only Jesus can have this effect on each person who will ask Him into their life and their heart. Yes, I do read my Bible and I have read the places where slavery was approved of, where genocide was approved of, but in both instances God was approving it because of the outcome of His people, not because He hated the ones that were supposed to be killed or enslaved. Pray for our country and its leaders, those who actually know how to lead at least, and for the mercy of God to come to our country and not His judgement upon it!

Good news for ALL people!


Our God and our Savior loves you all and you have an appointed time with Him! It is not a judgement time, if you just come to believe in Who He is and what He did for you!! This is a simple message but a powerful one, so powerful in fact that after the dream that I had of Him this morning (it is 3:12 a.m.) I had to get up and write this to tell all of you the good news!!!

God truly is NOT dead, He is alive and Jesus is coming soon to claim His Bride for His own. But that news alone is not the GOOD NEWS, it is that if you truly believe in your heart and confess Him before men then you will be saved, that’s it! We are not required to do anything or perform any “tasks” for Him, just believe as a little child that Jesus did what God’s Word, the Bible, says that He did. When you can come to that belief in faith like a child, then you will be changed into a child of God.

I am not saying that you will fly up to Heaven the moment that you are saved, but your soul, your spirit will be counted as a citizen of God’s Kingdom and from that moment on you are not the same! He loves you and wants to bring you into knowledge of Him, a loving knowledge of Himself, like that of a toddler to your Father! That is the kind of relationship that God wants to have with you from the moment that you believe and on into eternity!

Isn’t this AWESOME, the Creator of the universe wants to know you personally, every day. Not just at Christmas services and Easter, but every day. He cares for you like nobody on Earth can, just because He is God! You don’t have to do anything to receive this blessing, except answer the call in your heart, in your soul that you may have felt before, but you didn’t know what it was or even why you felt it. Yes, the emptiness that you have felt is telling you that something is missing, and that something is Jesus! Nothing will fix the feeling, nothing else will work in that spot in your heart. It is a place that only one Person, only one relationship will be the right one and that is the relationship with Jesus that needs to begin today!

Don’t put it off until tomorrow! Now is the appointed time to be saved and to come to know Him for Who He is, He is your Lord and Savior and He has always been waiting for you to come to Him. He doesn’t force you into a relationship, forced servitude is not a loving relationship. You have to be willing to come, you need to learn of Him and about Him, because only in Him and through Him can you be saved from the fate that awaits Satan and his demons.

Why would a loving God do that to you or anyone else? Because, if you have rejected His offer of grace and mercy through the belief in Jesus and His sacrifice, then you are no better and no different from Satan, who wanted to place his throne above God’s throne! You are rebelling against God when you choose to be separated from Him, but it is your choice, God is not the One who condemns you to hell, you are. By rejecting His grace and your salvation through Jesus, you are rejecting God Himself and all that He is offering to you, and by doing that you are no better than any demon or principality or even Satan himself. The “lie” that many people have believed is that they will always have the time to come to know Jesus. But, we are not guaranteed tomorrow. We have been given the grace and the ability to come to Him today and only by accepting that grace, by asking Him to come into your heart and change you into the person that God knows you can be will you be able to stand before Him with all of your sins covered in the righteousness of Jesus.

That’s it…that is all that is required or necessary. Just belief in Jesus and in His sacrifice and asking Him to change you into the person that you should be. Give your life to Him because He is coming…sooner than you think!

Help, we need, our Father can give it


There is a picture that I found on Facebook that needs to be here and here it is:

What about this picture is beautiful? Everything. The sun for the day, the warmth from the sun which God placed there just for us, the woman who isGivemePeace praying, these are all beautiful creations and all are part of the world that God created. We are the ones who make bad decisions, the ones who follow the wrong people or the wrong ideology, even the wrong teaching from a pastor who is deluded into thinking that he has the best way of saving people or whatever.

Thinking more of yourself than you ought to will only cause a greater fall one day. Considering your own thoughts and words to mean more than God’s Word will truly condemn you. Yes, there are preachers who do this today, but hopefully their followers are not very vocal.

God loves each one of us, every day, whether we love ourselves or our circumstances or not. Give thanks to God in all circumstances, regardless of the pain or the sorrow because this life is temporary and so are the problems contained in it. He loves you and will provide the strength and the comfort to bring you through whatever you find yourself in. What can we do that will make a difference in other people’s lives? For one, live your life as close to Jesus as you can if you are a Christian, then others will see Him through your life. If you don’t believe in God or Jesus, then you need to be seeking Him. He cares about you and loves you as His child, as His creation, all that He is waiting for is for you to come to Him.

 

Who was your builder?


Psalm 127:1 says this: “Except the Lord build the house, the labor in vain that build it; except the Lord keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain.”

Your body was put together by God for a purpose in this life. It did not happen by chance, nor did it happen without His knowledge. God is our Creator regardless of what the critics say about our world or the universe itself. One day, this will be evident to all but until then I must go on telling people about Christ and His offer of salvation and about our Lord’s will for all to come to repentance in Him. There are many today who reject this teaching, many more who are deceived into thinking that the road or path that they are on will carry them into His presence when they die.

Life has a way, and by life I mean that God has a way of working things out so that His purposes are fulfilled. We are not in control, He is, and we had better realize that before it is too late. There are many people who think that just because they have been to church a few times in their lives that they are “OK with the Man upstairs.” What a load of baloney! First and foremost, calling Him that is insulting to God! Second, going to church once or twice a year or for special occasions is a good thing, but being in church even for a lifetime doesn’t get you into Heaven! Being a preacher won’t even get you in the gates of Heaven if you have not accepted Jesus as your Lord and Savior!

You can memorize the Bible from beginning to end, but unless you believe in what it says and in Jesus as your Savior, being able to quote the Bible from memory won’t help you either! Until God’s Spirit calls you and touches your heart, drawing you to Jesus in faith, you won’t turn to Jesus and you can’t just decide to do so unless He has called you!

I have even heard some so-called “pastors” saying that they were going to ride their congregations until they could find a bigger one. Sounds to me like they weren’t called to be pastors, they chose to act as a pastor in order to get money from the church and the prestige of being a “pastor” when they really aren’t one at all! These are the “pastors” which give Christianity a bad reputation and they are actually leading people in the wrong direction too. God will deal with them in due time.

When we are called to be a Christian, each of us knows it because you can feel it in your heart and your soul. The person which God speaks to is the soul living within you and when He calls, your real self knows it. It is not a wrong number and it can’t be faked. You can choose to ignore Him for a time, but eventually you will listen and obey His call. How do I know this? Because I tried to ignore Him for a while. I could feel the call on my life, my heart or soul could tell Who was calling, but I didn’t want to answer yet. He kept calling until one day, I did answer and my life hasn’t been the same since…it has been so much more, well more!

When we have finally come to our spiritual senses and come to Him in repentance then He can use our talents that He gave you for His purposes and for the good of the Body of Christ. Think about it, seek Him out and He will come into your life and change it into the life that you were meant to have!

Love the people, not the lifestyle


Regardless of what you call it, a sin is a sin in God’s eyes.

It can be a lifestyle or a life-choice or it could be a religion or a belief. It can even be a church or a temple or a synagogue but the truth is that regardless of the place that you worship or the religion, belief, or lifestyle that you practice…when God is NOT the object or the center of your life, then you are worshipping an idol. We can make anything into an idol, from our spouse to our car or even a job and it’s paycheck. We can also worship our grandchildren or children or someone else who is dead and gone. We can worship or rely on money or position in a company or life in general, but what about the Creator of Life itself and all of the things which we see, feel, hear, taste and touch on a daily basis?

It seems that we are more concerned with our senses and our surroundings than we are about the One who created it all. It is okay to look down your nose at someone it seems but to put down their religion or their belief is uncalled for, especially if you are talking about Christians.

Oh, I am sorry, I got that one backwards! You can’t put down anyone or their beliefs UNLESS they are Christians!

That is how the media and the world look at those of us who believe in Jesus these days. We are bigots, and we are intolerable, and we are totally against whatever it is that you like to do with your life?!? REALLY!?

Honestly, I don’t care what you do or who or what you may worship or even if you choose NOT to believe or worship anything or anyone! My writing…my witness here is simply because my Redeemer told me and the other disciples to “tell all of the world about the gospel”, that’s it!

Jesus died for us, all of us, so that our sins could be forgiven. God doesn’t like sins of any kind, whether it is the lie being told about taking a pen from work or being a homosexual or even being a mass murderer. To God, a sin is the same regardless of how you rank it on a scale.

Just as you wouldn’t let me come to live in your house, if you didn’t know me, God won’t let you into Heaven if He doesn’t know you! It doesn’t matter what you have or haven’t done in your life, God has always pursued a relationship with each of us. He did it with Adam and He is still seeking that relationship now with each of us, but it is your choice whether you will seek Him out and continue in that relationship.

I am not going to tell you that being a homosexual will keep you out of Heaven, but it is the sin of practicing homosexuality and the rejection of Jesus that will do that. Repent of the sin, ask Jesus to come into your life and change you into the person that God knows you can be! Rejection of God’s grace toward us is the unpardonable sin, there is no specific sin other than that which will keep you from being forgiven!

Turn your eyes and your life toward Jesus…spiritual eyes can see Him and the forgiveness that He offers. You can read and understand His Word too, if you will ask Him to reveal its meaning in your life, because it has a different meaning to each person. What one person gets from the Psalms may be totally different from what another person may get. This is true for each book in the Bible, from Genesis to Revelation. Seek God and His Kingdom through His Word and ask Him to show you what you need to know and do from His Word. Then join Him every morning or evening by learning more of Him.