Category: Happiness is a choice

Thinkin’ about stuff…


300px-Pooh_and_Piglet,_Thinking

I really like Pooh Bear. His philosophy of life is profound and simple. Eat, enjoy life with your friends, think about…stuff. Like, how clouds look and how they get around, why is the Sun so bright, could I fly to the moon? All important questions, especially when you don’t want to think about the REAL world and its problems. Life is a question from the time that we can talk and make sentences until the day that we, in the words of Commander Data “go offline”. How can we really enjoy life when there are so many questions? Do we have to answer them all? I am only adding to the number of questions by asking all of these.

The point is that we are beings who think. Our minds work all of the time, except while we are asleep and some say that we actually solve many of our problems while we are asleep we just don’t realize it at the time. Unconscious thoughts, words, meanings and emotions cloud our thinking and crowd out the really weird stuff, but only while we sleep. When we are awake, we have news and Facebook and Instagram and conversations over our phones and computers as well as with other human beings. Not to mention the things which we really have to do, like go to work, drive the car, watch for the other people on the highway around us, then do our job (whatever that might be) and then drive home and either fix something to eat for our family or get it as take-out from a restaurant.

Your life and mine are constantly in motion. Our minds rarely have a chance to catch up with everything that we are doing, and yet I haven’t even mentioned giving time to God or Bible study and meditation, prayer, etc. It is possible to do all of these things but when you write them down…they look so overwhelming! God gave us the ability to do this but we take it for granted, because from the time we first start going to school, more things are added to our daily menu of things to do every day! It seems that we are never really caught up or that we ever will catch up. Why?

More questions. Think…think…think..what can we do that doesn’t require so much energy, so much brainpower? I don’t have the answer to that, unless you might want to play some games on a console or on the computer, that is a mostly brain-less activity in my opinion. So, without being brain-less, how about getting into God’s Word? The wisdom contained in it doesn’t require us to really think, just believe in Him and His wisdom, as well as in His Son Who made it possible for us to come to God at any time that we need Him, regardless of the circumstance.

Once Jesus took care of the atonement or payment for our sins, all that we have to do is to believe in Him and what He did and ask Him to forgive us and to help us be more like Him in our daily lives. So that we can bring His message to others and, if the Holy Spirit draws them, maybe they will want to give their lives to Him as well. Christians don’t go on jihad (except for the ones that were deceived by their church in the Middle ages), Christianity cannot be forced on anyone and neither can any other religion!

Please consider your eternal soul and really think…think this through before deciding to follow Jesus or not. The decision can be the most valuable in your lifetime, because then your true, eternal life won’t end at all! 

Blue, down or depressed..which is it?


When you feel down, you don’t want to do anything. When you feel blue, you just don’t feel right. Depression makes you feel this way too, but in a more concrete way, by that I mean in a way that is not easily gotten over. Which of course is another thing that many people will tell you with all of the insensitivity that this contains, “Get over it!”.

When you feel like you are blue or you are just having a bad day, nothing seems to go right.
Depression and feeling depressed gives you a bad day which lasts much longer, sometimes, than you would care for it to.

Feeling blue or down in the dumps can be fixed by a lively song or a cheerful child or even a happy book or movie. The “blues” go away and you are yourself again. Depression is something which cannot be fixed by a happy song or any of the things which help a “blue” day. As a matter of fact, some of these so-called fixes can make the depression worse…can make it even deeper than it was.

Feeling sorry for yourself is another form of the “blues”, but it is nothing in comparison to depression at all. It’s like comparing a fire-cracker to an atomic bomb, they both go “BOOM”, but with far greater intensity and destruction in the atomic bomb’s case.

It is the same with depression, feeling blue is easily fixed…while depression is like an ongoing “bad day”. Drugs can help, but chemicals only go as far as they can go. Therapy can help, but confession to others only gives you a support group to spread the pain around with.

Time, prayer, and faith in God’s healing power is the only real cure for depression. Although, Satan will try to derail that with more intense feelings of despair and depression. The answer….I don’t have it. It is found in God’s Word, in faith and in fellowship with God’s people. Fellowship and the caring love demonstrated by them toward you, as a child of God, is the only REAL cure but it still takes time. It is not a quick fix, like we expect in our society today.

It is not easy and coming to the church is hard to do especially when you are depressed, because there will always be someone who thinks that you are just feeling sorry for yourself, when that is far from the truth. Whether they voice their opinion or not doesn’t matter, the look that you may get are just as cutting…just as hurtful.

You can fake “getting better”, but inside depression doesn’t go away like “feeling blue or down”. It is more similar to an alcoholic. Some think that it is a personal demon to be conquered, but it is one that truly doesn’t go away entirely. An alcoholic may be sober for years, but one drink can send them back and depression is like that. You might be OK for a while, but one trigger, one bad day can send you right back into the well of depression again.

Prayer and fellowship is the only real helpful fix for your state of mind. Intercessory prayer from friends is more helpful than anyone can know, so I am asking for this from all of you, and I Thank you in advance for your prayers.

God has not forgotten you!


The question is truly yours, not God’s. Are you interested in Him? He cares because you are alive, but do you care about what He wants in your life?GodisInterestedinYou Have you ever been close to God in your life and then walked away? Many people have done this and then wonder what happened to their relationship with God. Facebook and Twitter are some wonderful social networking sites to keep in touch with family and friends who may be scattered all over the country and I am thankful for my friends there. Have you ever considered that going to church on Sunday morning is a way to re-connect with God if you don’t feel particularly close to Him right now? It doesn’t matter if some of the people at the church don’t like you or if you think that they are hypocrites, God never stopped loving you and He will meet you wherever you wish.

But, He would like for you to come to His house, where the church meets. The church is not a building or a tabernacle or a shrine, it is the people who gather together to worship God in the same spirit that the early church did. You can have a personal meeting with God and Jesus regardless of who may be there or what they think about you. Who cares what they think, it is Jesus that you came to worship and it is Him and the Father that you need in your life!

The trouble with all of the divisions in our church congregations is that we tend to split over things which shouldn’t be issues at all. At least to believers, IMO. We have been placed in the places where we are for a purpose and until we accomplish that purpose, there will always be a part of our lives which feels uneasy and empty. You might ask, “How can I find the purpose for my life?”. I know that the answer to this question is going to upset some, but your purpose in life can be found in the Bible.

God’s Kingdom is going to manifest itself in this world soon. Everyone will see it and it will split the world in ways that nobody ever considered. The prophecies in the book of Revelation will come to pass whether we like it or not. It will not be a good time to be a believer but it won’t be a time when those who follow the side that has food and a place to stay will enjoy either. Oh, they will for a short time, but those who refuse to give their lives to Jesus and face persecution because of it will be the victors in the end.

How can you or I know this? Because it is in God’s Word! God cannot lie and the prophecies contained in it have all come true up to the point of the eventual “ruler” of the world being revealed and the other seals being broken. Is God interested in you? Yes, He knows the number of hairs on your head and what you are doing during every minute of the day. He knows this about every person on Earth, not just Christians. Because He could be calling you to be His child, His disciple so that you can have a purpose in His Kingdom now and in the future.

Don’t you realize that God is always near you, whether you feel that closeness or not. He is there. He shows His love to us, all of us, because of the life that you have. We have this planet to live on, we have air to breathe and a place to call home. Many of us have families and jobs, those are blessings from God. We are loved by the Creator of everything, isn’t that awesome!! He created the entire universe, worlds and galaxies that we can’t see with our natural eyes and that are far bigger and so vast that the limits of it we can’t comprehend, yet He pays attention to every bird that falls to the ground on Earth. If He cares that much about them, don’t you think that He cares much more about each of us that are created in His Image?

If you are loved that much by the Creator and you are, then don’t you think that you should return His love by giving your life to Him? Think about it.

Independence or dependence, it’s your choice


We celebrate Independence Day tomorrow in America and for us it is usually a big day, but I wonder what is happening elsewhere? I know, watch the news to find out or get on the ‘net and look it up. But, what else is going on besides that which I can find out from those sources? Have we finally achieved peace all over the world? No. Is it possible that I can go to sleep and not lock my doors? No, not yet. When will lasting peace and living without fear be achieved on our world and in the places where we live? Can we, as our flawed human selves, achieve this by mutual cooperation?

Only in television shows and in Utopian novels about a future like that envisioned by Gene Roddenberry does this come about. Humanity can’t agree on which team to bet on or even which type of coffee that we like or if we could get along with those people who live in another country with a different culture than our own! We live in compartmentalized worlds, some of which are so separate we can’t even trust the people on the next street, let alone those living in a different country!

On top of this, we have forgotten the One Who brought all of this about in the first place. We have pushed Him and the morality that past generations relied upon completely out of our schools, our government and in many cases even our families. We have declared our independence from God!

Consider this….what if He was to take His hand off of our lives and our world entirely? Let nature and all of the processes of weather and earthquakes and other natural phenomena happen without His control and protection! I know that many people would think that He doesn’t care about us anyway so what would be the difference? When it happens, you will know.

That sounds as if I am saying that God will take His hand and His influence off of our world doesn’t it? Not exactly. During the time that is prophesied in the book of Revelation, God will allow Satan free rein to vent his wrath for a time, then the wrath of God will fall on those who still refuse to acknowledge Him. It is during this period that many people will think that God has truly abandoned them, but He has not and will not completely abandon anyone. God’s love still is expressed today toward each of us, whether we exercise our independence from Him or not. If you have decided that your life is better spent while in service to Him as a teacher or preacher or in some other way, then you are dependent upon Him for the words that you have or those that you speak as well as your life and livelihood.

If you have declared in some way that you can live your life without God’s influence and that you will do exactly what you want regardless of His influence, felt in your heart or not, then you are working in the way of the world and Satan’s rebellion as well. You may not worship Satan, you might not claim to be religious at all, but when you are at enmity with God then you are in the same camp as Satan is and in rebellion against everything that God represents.

Life itself is a miracle brought about by God. Whether you believe it or not doesn’t make it any less true. The world around us is special in that it is just as perfect as it could be to support all of the forms of life which exist here. Nowhere else, that we know of, has all of the combinations of gases to make the correct atmosphere or the water which abounds on our Earth. The minerals and salts which are present in all living things here in the correct proportion so that pH and viscosity and all other requirements for life are met and are present here because God made it that way. None of this was a cosmic accident!

Consider this small excerpt from a document at the Institute for Creation Research: “Elementary statistical theory shows that the probability of 200 successive mutations being successful is then (1⁄2) 200 , or one chance out of 10 60 . The number 10 60 , if written out, would be “one” followed by sixty “zeros.” In other words, the chance that a 200-component organism could be formed by mutation and natural selection is less than one chance out of a trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion, trillion! Lest anyone think that a 200-part system is unreasonably complex, it should be noted that even a one-celled plant or animal may have millions of molecular “parts.” “

The very idea that a molecule of an amino acid might organize itself, on its own, into a single-celled organism and then proceed to grow ever more complex into all manner of plant and animal life until you have all of the life on planet Earth is patently absurd! Without God, this is impossible and every reasonable scientist knows it they are just too full of pride in their “theory” to admit it to themselves or to anyone else. Life is not and cannot be completely independent from God. Think about it.

Fear….how can we overcome it?


Many people today have fears of all kinds. Some are afraid of flying, some are afraid of enclosed spaces, some are afraid of bugs or snakes or anything which crawls on the ground. These are natural fears, the kind that we learn while growing up and some are just fears which are genetic. Now, that is not to say that there is anything wrong with fear. A little fear can keep you from getting killed in certain situations, fear can give you a bit more speed at times when you really need it (Feet, don’t fail me now!!) 🙂

The point that I came here to make is that fear of things that we, as humans, can’t do anything about is not healthy. Fear of dying for example. Death and dying come to every person on this planet and there are none who can escape it…it is a fact and inevitable so get over it. The manner in which you die is what many people actually fear, such as drowning or having an automobile accident. Nobody wants to experience either of those because we fear the  pain which will likely come as a result.

In the book of Judges, Gideon is getting ready to fight with thirty thousand men and God tells him that he has too many men, let those who are fearful go home, and he lost twenty-two thousand men right off the bat! There was a lot of fear in that group don’ t you think? God’s reason for thinning out the number was not to get rid of those who were afraid, but to show His glory and His ability to fight for Israel. Gideon did not need that many men to fight the Amalekites, and even after the first bunch left he still had over ten thousand and God told him that there were still too many.

God knew that with such a large force, Israel would think that it was their power that had defeated their enemies and He wanted to show them that He would fight for them if they would let Him. To continue the story, God tells Gideon to watch them as they drink from the stream. Those who lapped the water like a dog would be the ones that he would use as his army, so Gideon was left with only three hundred out of ten thousand.

Why am I telling you this story from the Bible? Simply to point out that God can overcome any obstacle, no matter how big it seems to us but only if we let Him do it. He won’t take over your life, you still have a choice to make every day. If you ask Him to come into your day and help you with your everyday problems, He will, but He won’t fix them for you. You have to learn to listen to Him and then use what He has told you to fix them yourself. It is the obedience that we have always had a problem with. Adam couldn’t do it and many others in the course of time had problems with obeying the words and the prophecies given by God and we do too.

You can call it “being stubborn or hard-headed” if you wish, but the point is that humanity is that way and Satan uses it against us. We think that we are doing it, that it is our idea or our solution when the solution has come from Satan if it goes against God’s will for your life. “But, how can I know what God’s will is for my life?” you may ask. The answer to this is easy and hard too. You have to sit down and read a book….the Bible, God’s Word and wisdom for us. Pray about His will for you while you read it and you will find it, He will reveal it to you, but you have to put some effort into it. Reading a few verses here and some over there won’t help and in fact will confuse you even more. Begin at the beginning and read through, then pray about it and read it again. The fear of God will leave and the love of God will show up in your life and in your heart. Learn about Him because He already knows everything about you!

Gloom, despair and depression…why do we have them?


“Why are you in despair, O my soul? And why have you become disturbed within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him, The help of my countenance and my God.” Psalm 42:11

The words above were written for us today. Because they speak to the depression and the solitude which Satan uses to take over our life and make it one which is filled with despair and gloom and darkness. Why does he do this? Because he doesn’t want you to tell anyone about Jesus and he knows that if you are “down in the dumps”, you won’t feel like spreading the Good News of Jesus to anyone! If he can stop you from telling one person, he has done his duty. Because, that one that you miss because of your depression just might be the next great evangelist and he doesn’t want that.

If it was your business to do the things that make people miserable, like Satan’s purpose is today, you wouldn’t want some on-fire evangelist out there spreading the Gospel to everyone that he meets! It doesn’t matter to Satan how he accomplishes his goal, if he has to kill thousands to do away with the one that could bring a message of hope and love to even a few people, he will do it! But…God’s plans will always win out. Satan may think he has won, but God knows the outcome and He knows where the next follower of Christ is and what they can do.

Satan hates us as human beings because God loved us more than He loved the angels, of which Satan was a principle cherub, the guardians of God. Not only does he hate humanity because of God’s love for us but because of the special position that God gave to us, the relationship that we can have with God through His Son. So, you see it isn’t personal, he just hates us with such a deep and abiding hatred that no human could ever understand it. Satan will make people think that he will reward them with power and wealth and he might for a time, but the day will come when your “contract” will be up. No amount of money or power will save you from the eternal punishment that will fall on you because you chose to align yourself with the consummate liar and deceiver that is Satan.

Some religions teach that there is no eternal punishment for us because Jesus paid that price and we are all saved through Him. Well, technically that is true but if you have not repented of your sins and asked Jesus into your heart and your life, you don’t have Him as Lord and Savior to keep you from being thrown into the lake of fire with Satan and his followers. Just as if I told you that I have one hundred dollars that I will give you, if you don’t come to my home and claim it then you still don’t have it. The offer of salvation is there, the price has been paid and once you take hold of it then your salvation cannot be un-done, but if you don’t grasp it and repent of your sinful ways and follow Jesus when you ask Him into your heart, then they were just words and nothing more. You can even get baptised in front of a church or in a stream, but without repentance and a commitment to follow Jesus, you just got wet in front of an audience and nothing more.

The Church which was started on the day of Pentecost was not a specific denomination. It wasn’t called the Church of God or the Church of Christ or the Pentecostal church. At the time, the Jews in Israel called them believers of the Way, a sect that they wanted to crush and destroy. Which is why they sent Saul to imprison and beat the believers in this “Way”. The persecution of believers began then and it has not stopped since. It may be subtle here in America, in other countries it is more pronounced and vigorous. Elsewhere, Christians are imprisoned, beaten, and sometimes killed because of their belief in Jesus.

Satan has used this jealousy and animosity against the Church to destroy and persecute it for centuries simply because he wants to undo the plans of God as much as he can. That is why there is so much suffering in the world and so much pain and death. God allows this because He gives each of us a choice, whether to follow Him or not. Without a choice, there is no real love. Think about this, if someone tried to force you to follow them or love them….would you? I wouldn’t.

Adult to child or child to adult, which way is it?


When we are young, we can’t wait to get older. When we get older, we want to feel young and act that way. It is so hard to get away from being a child it seems. So, why is it hard to imagine people being childish regardless of their age or their occupation?

We all want to grow up or at least we are supposed to, but looking at the way our culture is today it seems to be taking a long time for many people to do so. If they ever do. Yes, the correct direction is supposed to be from child to adult but it seems that we have gotten confused in the past few decades, not just in America but all over the world. People enjoy things in their middle age that they enjoyed when they were children, even into their later decades of life people tend toward being childish at times concerning some things.

Why is it this way? Because when we get older, we want to have things our way, just as we did when we were toddlers. We may not throw a tantrum about it, but sometimes we do. We are being given things today in our everyday lives that we would’ve had to work for a few decades ago and we get them almost instantly. Games give us instant gratification in winning, you can order anything online now and you would’ve had to travel to get those things years ago, especially books. We can get them instantly delivered over the Internet without having to go anywhere or pay shipping. We can get online and talk with our friends that we haven’t seen in more than twenty years, yet we both are in our own homes hundreds of miles away in some instances and we aren’t even paying for long distance charges to do so!

Our culture and the way that we live in today has gotten so addicted to instant everything and constant information availability, until if something happened to all of this connectivity….we would be totally LOST! Many people would likely even commit suicide because they couldn’t get in touch or look up something. Being childish about some things is OK, being addicted to information overload is just ridiculous. We have intellect and intelligence but to someone coming from a different planet, it would not seem so at times.

Why have we lost our way so badly? Because we have moved away from God and His wisdom. Many of us have Bibles in our homes, many thousands of people have them on their eBook readers but do we read them? Some do, many don’t. The wisdom contained in the Bible is wisdom from God written down through the prompting of the Holy Spirit and it was sent to us for our benefit. Pushing it to the back of the room or throwing it away doesn’t change anything. Ignoring the Word of God doesn’t get rid of any Truth contained in it, just as ignoring the law of gravity doesn’t get rid of it either.

Reading God’s Word, studying it and praying for Him to open your eyes to the Truth is something which all Christians should be doing as we come to the end of the age. Many don’t want to believe that we are so close to it, but when it gets here….you won’t need a news program to tell you that it is, people all over the world will know it at the same time. Our education system has gotten so far from the Word of God and pushed any of its teachings out of the classroom until our society is paying the price for its arrogance in doing so now. The biggest problem with this is that once we have given up on teaching these things, there is no remedy, no way to introduce sanity back into our schools and society again without a HUGE backlash.

Childish, yes we are in more ways than most would like to admit. Sanity and being an adult seem to not go hand in hand anymore and IMO it is because of the absence of the Bible in the home and in schools that is the reason behind it all. How can we fix it? The sad truth is that we can’t. Only the return of Jesus will do that and His return will be sooner than many are willing to admit.

Life today?


So, what do you do? Is your so-called “life” bound up in your occupation or in something else? Does your family enjoy most of your time or do you spend it working at the office? Do you travel a lot on business? These are occupations or at least the reflections of what is important to you. So, does your life reflect what is really important in your life or even what is important to you? Or does your life reflect things that you desire or “stuff” that really doesn’t count for anything?

These questions are some that we all need to ask ourselves at least once, not just once a year but once a week and sometimes once every day! Your life will be far more and have much more meaning if you latch on to Jesus and His message today! Living your life with Christ in the center is the best way to live it, even if it costs you your stuff, it may not cost you everything but it will cost something. Some of your friends may not like it that you are really following Jesus, they may not want a “Christian” as a friend because it will make them look bad!

You know what? If they feel that way, then they weren’t your friend anyway! Being a friend of Jesus and following Him is far better and more rewarding than having friends here which are just friends during the good times. Life comes from God, the air that we breathe comes from Him, the ground that you walk on every day was created for you by Him. The beating of your heart and the heart of everyone around you is His grace toward you for today. You are not guaranteed tomorrow, so the beating of your heart will only go on as long as God decrees that it will.

He loves you and me and everyone else on this planet and only He knows why!! He may not like some of the things which we do or say about Him or against Him, but He still loves you regardless because He is God! We need to love Him in return for the air that we breathe and the job that we have and the family that we have because He gave all of those things, good things, to us. I know that if you are in an abusive relationship you might not think that it is a blessing and you may be right, but God is still with you in the place where you are no matter how dark or hellish it might be.

God cares for you and for your family. He loves us, all of us so much that He sacrificed His Son so that we would have the covering of Christ’s blood to allow us to come into His presence every minute of every day if need be! We don’t have to go to a priest, we don’t have to have a certain amount of money or power to get God’s attention! All that we have to do is be humble enough to tell Him that ” I messed up, God, please forgive me and cleanse me from my sinful ways. Come into my life and my heart and fix what is broken. Thank you, Lord, for loving me enough that I can come to you for this and for all of my troubles and trials. In Jesus’ Holy name I humbly ask this of you, Amen.”

That is all that it takes to be a child of God. Just a simple, humble prayer. No haughty spirit will get this, no prideful person need come, no un-repentant person should “try God” because it won’t work! God knows your heart, He knows where you were last night and what you said on the phone to someone who you shouldn’t have been talking to. Nothing can be hidden from Him because He sees each of us as we REALLY are at all times. Even a prayer that is said humbly as the man in the temple did, “Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner!”, is heard when it comes from a repentant heart! Please, give Him a chance to show you His love and mercy while there is time to do so. Don’t just read this and think about it, do it!

 

Beauty in the Cosmos


If, like me, you watched the series Cosmos on television then you were struck by the wonder and majesty of all that mankind has discovered. The beauty of the galaxies and nebulae, and of the planets in the system where we are at home. But…did you notice that they completely disregard any sort of notion that all of this was designed by a Designer? Nowhere did they show any kind of religious splendor and humility toward the discoveries of the universe itself. Everything in our universe came from a microscopic singularity that just exploded one day and blew out all of the matter, dark and otherwise, into the universe. Then, all on its own, everything just organized itself together into galaxies and stars and planet systems and bacteria, etc.

Come on! Entropy and the universe at large does not work that way and scientists know this! What happened? They theorize that gravity pulled everything together and then nature took its turn. Really?

Yes, the galaxies and nebulae are beautiful to look at and wondrous to behold, but their beauty points not to a random accident of gases and rocks coming together but to the awesomeness of God! He is the designer and builder of all that we see in the heavens. He is the One who put the stars in their places and called them by name. He is also the One Who called forth the light to begin the whole of creation in the first place. No super-collider of any kind is going to find God in a microscopic particle that lasts for a nanosecond and then vanishes!

God can only be found in the Bible, which Isaac Newton studied. They didn’t mention that in the series. Most of the great scientists up until Charles Darwin, believed what is in God’s Word and their research in the heavens was simply to confirm God’s Word not to deny it or to refute it. The answer to your problems, whatever they may be, is Jesus and the relationship that you will have with Him when you ask Him into your heart. God can heal the hurts in your life whether they are emotional or physical and He most certainly can answer your spiritual questions and confusion.

God is the answer when all other answers fail because He is our Creator and everything which is was created by Him, including all of humanity. The ones who have committed sinful acts such as rape, murder, sodomy, stealing, disrespect toward parents and other sins are still loved by God and He will forgive them of their crimes against His commandments if they will repent and ask for His forgiveness. Then follow His ways and His Truth. When they do this, they are adopted into His family forever. You don’t fall from grace after you have received it, you may stumble and fall down by doing something out of character for a Christian but you have not been tossed aside by God. Satan is just trying to make you think that is what will happen.

The world and the cosmos are all God’s handiwork, there is no denying it. You can’t say that these things just miraculously came together without a Miracle Worker! It isn’t possible! As I have said before, your life and everything in it came from God. Your talent, your family, your job, your income, and yes even the pets that you enjoy the company of all came from God’s hand. Many are prideful enough to think that they did all of these things, but you can’t even change the color of one whisker let alone have an effect on your life! God loves you and if you have felt His call…His pull on your heart and have not answered it, I urge you to do so as soon as you can!

Think about it and ask Him to show you what He has for you.

Time…is…ticking…away…from…us


We have a certain amount of time to live, but only God knows how much each of us has. What are you doing with your time?

Do you spend it worried about your bills? Working to make more money so you can pay more of them off or are you trying to buy more “stuff”?

We need to be concentrating on things which have an impact in our life and in the lives of others. Not just as workers or business owners or …. well you get the picture, but as people who genuinely care for one another. In today’s world that is something that is sorely missing. I don’t want to bring up any news headlines, but people are not taught to respect each other nor are they taught, it seems, to respect life itself. Too many news stories are on the web and television about life being taken for no apparent reason. Yes, this has happened in the past, but not to the extent that it is happening today.

You and I only have today. We are not guaranteed tomorrow or next week, let alone next month or next year! We may live to be seventy-five or eighty-five if we are fortunate, but then there are those who may not make it to the end of this sentence or even to sundown today. The point of this is that time is precious and it begins ticking away the moment that we are born. Your heart beats many thousands of times during the day, pumping blood to all of your vital areas. But, it will only beat so long and God knows exactly how many beats that each of us has left.

Yes, God knows how long you will live and how you will die. He knows when too, so what are you going to do with the rest of the time that you have? What will you do about the eternity that you will step into when this life is over? Regardless of what you may have heard, there is a life after this one and it doesn’t end, how you will spend it is dependent upon your decision in this life, here and now. Will you give your life to Jesus and ask Him to forgive you for your sins, regardless of the sin? Will you ignore what that empty area in your life that you feel needs something in it but you don’t know what it is? That is the part of you that God created which desires Him to fill it with Himself!

Only the Spirit of God fits in that part of you, and if it feels empty now, just try to put something else in there…it will feel worse. It will feel as if it gets bigger and bigger until you decide to fill it with Him. The emptiness in your life will not go away until Jesus fills it with Himself, so to consider something else is foolish.

It has taken me about forty minutes to get this far and that is forty minutes that none of us will get back. Seek Him while you can. He will empower you to do things for His Kingdom that is true, but the rewards in heaven are such that we can’t imagine while we are alive now.