What is your trigger?

It seems that today, people get “ticked off” at the drop of a pin or anything that has happened to someone who they don’t know at all. Maybe they have something in common with that person and feel that it, whatever “it” was, was directed at them in general. Such as the people who protest against police violence toward “black men”. They are protesting because they perceive that all police are racist and have a chip on their shoulders against all people of color. Which is not true, but for some reason it is coming to the front of news stories more and more today. Why?

Some would say that it is because it is happening more often and that the violence is justified. The “trigger” is very subtle though and it is not happening more often, it is because everyone in the street has a smart phone and it is capable of recording video of anything, anywhere and at any time. There doesn’t have to be a news crew around, but by recording an event, regardless of its significance, and uploading it to the Internet then it may become newsworthy.

I have a trigger which moves me to pray for all of those who come to this site and read or just look around. I don’t know most of you, but God does. Even if you have never attended church or sat through a sermon, God knows who you are. He values you above the riches of the whole world. He loves you enough that if you were the last person on Earth, He would want you as His adopted child. It isn’t fear or anger or frustration which drives us, it is our collective need for this world to be healed and all of the problems which we face every day to be taken care of. Only Jesus can do this.

Other religions boast of having more followers or having larger church buildings or worship centers, it doesn’t matter what they are called. If you aren’t worshiping God and His Son, Jesus, then you are in the wrong building. I know, there are many who would tell me that my way of thinking is too small or non-inclusive of others, but aren’t most religions today? Islam doesn’t allow for other faiths, you have to accept theirs, yet no one ever tells them to be quiet and not pray or not tell others about their faith. It is the same with any other faith in the world, with the exception of Christianity. We, who are Christians, and believe God’s Word can’t read our Holy Scriptures in public. We cannot pray openly, we cannot tell others about our Savior because it offends people.

Jesus said to turn the other cheek when someone strikes you. I think we have done that far too often, yet we are still doing it. Why? Because, Jesus said for us to endure persecution to the end and we will be saved. Is this world going to be better in the future? Yes, it will when Jesus sets up His Kingdom and rules the world from Jerusalem. But, until that time comes we must endure.

Yes, there is anger and bitterness in many cities today but there is also…hope. Hope for tomorrow, hope for a peaceful day today, hope for reconciliation between police and those who protest against them. Where does this spirit of hope come from?

Jesus.

The world can’t give you hope, but He can. The world doesn’t care about you or your circumstances, but He does. The world is ruled by the spirit of Antichrist, Satan and his followers and it shows in the news and in our papers every day. Jesus loves you and wants all of us to share in His love but in order to do that, we need to accept Him and then share Him with others too.

Torture and anguish

I thought that might get your attention. Yes, I am speaking of what Jesus went through during His Passion week, although I don’t like that term. He was tried unjustly, whipped mercilessly even though only thirty-nine times, and then crowned with a crown of thorns and crucified with six-inch iron nails in His arms and ten inch iron nails through His feet.

The movie which came out a few years ago tried to show the gruesome details of this, but it would’ve had an X rating for bloody violence alone if it had. I have a copy of a three strand flagellum with the lead tips which have glass and bone and a nail embedded in them. It does a terrific job on a cardboard box, I can’t imagine the damage that it would do to a human body. The damage that you see in the picture is just 1 strike on the box that it came in. Consider that cardboard is a bit tougher than human skin and use your imagination a bit and you can imagine a little of the damage that it might do to a body. Jesus was a man and that is the type of tool that was used on His body before He was crucified!

I truly can understand why He was asking the Father about allowing the cup to pass from Him if possible. But, He told the Father “not my will but thine be done”, what an AWESOME Savior we have. I can’t imagine the pain that one full force hit from this would feel like and I don’t want to experience it, but thirty-nine lashes with it? I imagine most of us would pass out well before that point from the pain.

Jesus truly loves us far more than we can ever imagine or know, until we are with Him in Glory! Even then we wouldn’t be able to describe it or how it feels to anyone alive, this was the problem that John had when he was writing the book of Revelation. The sights and the feelings of Heaven and the majesty and glory of God as well as the pure joy of being in His Presence had to be beyond what words can describe to someone who can’t see it or feel it! The difficulty would be like describing a color to someone who has never seen a color or describing a tree to a blind person. If they can’t touch it or feel it, they can’t understand it.

That is how it is with our faith in Jesus and the wisdom and glory of God. You can’t understand it or know of it without faith and if you don’t have faith it is like you are blind. You are spiritually blind because it takes faith to see and to know about these things from God. Consider what Jesus went through for our salvation and that He did it because He loves us, each one of us, far deeper and more real than any emotion that we can know on this side of Heaven.

Read Romans chapter 8 and Psalms 22 which describes in detail the crucifixion of Christ over nine hundred years before crucifixion was even known or used. Please, realize that you are special to God and that He loves you and that you can come to Him now, where you are by prayer and repentance.

What do you hear?

From the television and almost all of the news sources, mostly…JUNK! The world is going down the tubes fast, and all anyone seems to care about is their shows on TV or what is happening on Facebook. What difference does it make? Facebook, Twitter, Survivor, and so on are all just there to distract us from what is happening in the world. Yes, there are some on all of those social media sites which are talking about actual news, but what news?

What about our freedom? Freedom to worship ANY way you want to in America! We have that freedom right now, but it seems that there are so many on one side who can’t stand ANY mention of God or Jesus! I am not trying to force anyone, anywhere to worship the way that I do, but it seems that there are many who just can’t stand to read or hear about Jesus at all. If you want to worship a rock, I don’t care! That is your option, even God gave you the choice to do so even if He doesn’t agree with it.

We have a choice and it was given to us by God Himself. You can choose to believe it or not, it doesn’t matter to me. I pray that you will come to Him before your life is over, but it is your choice regardless of where you live, at least as far as I am concerned. Many of the countries in the world are not nearly free enough to have the choice of Who they worship, as we are in America.

Christians, whether you agree with their faith or not, are being killed not just persecuted and yet the Christians there are not converting to Islam. They would rather die for their faith, just as the martyrs have done for hundreds of years. I pray that we in America don’t see this kind of persecution, but it may happen yet.

What can we do? Pray for those in areas where Christians are being persecuted severely like in Iraq and Iran and Turkey. I don’t know what to tell you about things that we could do other than pray. Since God is in control and He can send Angels to comfort and help those people, prayer is powerful because God is able to deliver them by His power.

The world is tearing itself to pieces and it isn’t over, this is just the beginning. It actually hasn’t gotten to the point that most are fearing will come yet. Read your Bible, study the prophecies of Daniel and Revelation, pray about what you are reading. We are at the beginning of those times! Watch and pray that you will have the strength to endure until He comes again to take the church out of this.