Category: Religion

What do you value?


black-friday-software-dealsIn society, no matter where that society is, it seems to be respect and a standing in the community that is valued most. In some areas of society it is wealth and power and prestige that is valued more. There are times that all of those combine into one abiding and driving force in a society regardless of which country it may be in–and that is called greed. During the holidays, it seems that we value things far above people because of how much value we place on “stuff”.

We see it in the news and online, we see the effects of it in life around us but greed is actually a part of an overpowering emotion that humanity has been dealing with and losing the battle against ever since the Garden. That is pride. Pride of course can be a good thing when you are proud of your son or daughter for their accomplishments in school or even in life. But…it can get out of hand when pride in yourself and your status and your wealth swells up to the point of making you want more and more.

Our values and what we value should be a part of our life with Christ. Our life in general should be a reflection of our values and Jesus being a part of our life should be the standard by which our values are measured. What does He value in His ministry? Who does He value and why? When we find the answers to these questions, and they aren’t hard to find, then we will have the answer to having a life which reflects more of Him and less of our pride, less of us.

Why should our values be aligned with Jesus’ values? Because if you are a Christian then your life and the values that you have should be reflecting the same life, the same values which Jesus placed value in. If you claim to be a Christian but you live like the rest of the world and only go to church when it is necessary or maybe on holidays, weddings and funerals, then you are missing the point.

The Christian life is about believing in Jesus but also living with Him on a daily basis, gathering for prayer and worship of your Creator with other believers and becoming more like Him and less like the person that you were before. If this doesn’t describe your life with Jesus, then you may want to do a bit of soul-searching to see if you really are a Christian.

I am not writing this to put anyone down, but there are many people in America and in other places, who claim to be Christians BUT they never go to church. It is likely that they rarely read the Bible or pray and praise God, unless something is going wrong in their life or in their family. Then they seek His help and influence. God is not on call just when something goes wrong, He is supposed to be present in your life…every day!

God is not a genie. We shouldn’t treat Him as such, but there are many who seem to look at Him like this. God values your life so much that He sent Jesus to die on the cross, one of the most heinous and barbaric ways that anyone could die, in order to be the sacrifice for your sins! He would’ve done this even if there was only you to save, but He paid the price for ALL of humanity. Even though many won’t give their lives to Him and become a Christian, the price has already been paid for their sins.

Learn of Him and His Love for you. Seek Him out while there is still time in this life to do so. When you have breathed your last breath or if death comes suddenly tonight or tomorrow, your chance to change is over. Don’t put it off, please.

About Dad and Father’s Day


My father died in 2001 from a heart attack. My grandfather died in 1995 due to untreated COPD, although he never smoked as far as I know. I think it was due to his hobby of woodworking and breathing sawdust for many years. These were the two father figures in my life. One who was with me while growing up and one that wasn’t.

fathers-day-002I spent many hours, days even, being angry and hurt while I was growing up. Especially during my teen years. I felt betrayed and tossed aside by my dad, and my grandfather as good as he was didn’t know how to help me. I now realize that I wasn’t tossed aside by my dad, and my grandfather was at a loss about how to handle my feelings.

My real problem was that I got conflicting stories about our relationships. Sometimes it went one way and everything was OK. Then, later it would change and there would be frustration and bitterness mixed in with other feelings and being a teenager didn’t help. We would go to church and I would hear about the love of God and how we are supposed to emulate Him in our lives.

Then we would get home and things were…different. Nothing like what I had heard in church. There was no abuse or anything like that, but God’s Word wasn’t spoken of or read in our house until my grandfather was over 80. I would find him reading and studying the Bible then, but that didn’t happen while I was younger.

In many ways I would like to thank my father and grandfather for showing me what NOT to do in this life. So that when I became a father myself I would tell my son that I love him and I began reading the Bible when he was small. When he was 12 I became the pastor of a small church, so he got to see me preparing for sermons, praying and studying God’s Word.

Fathers have a lot on their shoulders, sometimes grandfathers do too. The only One Who can help the ENTIRE family to muddle through the teen years and come out still smiling and being a family is Jesus. Having that foundation in my life and my family’s life has helped me so much while raising my son. Since my family was broken before I even knew what a family was, I had no idea how to be a dad.

Thankfully, my wife and I had given our lives to Jesus before our son was born, although we were busy with work and I had gone back to school before I knew we were even having a child. Our life with Jesus suffered because of our work during this time because while I was in school, I worked in the lab at the hospital on the weekends. Sunday was my wife’s only day off, so many weekends during that time neither of us went to church. I do regret that, but it can’t be changed now.

God loves all of us and He doesn’t want us to live our lives without Him, but there are so many who choose to do this. Why? Because, love can’t be forced upon someone. God knows us better than we know ourselves because He has known us since before we were born, even from the beginning of creation. Just as any father on Earth, God wants a relationship with us. Seek to learn more about Him by reading His Word and praying for Him to reveal its wisdom to you for your life.

Have a wonderful Father’s Day!

Preaching from the Bible


Is this the actual way to do it? I mean, if you are a preacher of the gospel aren’t you supposedTaketheGospeltoAll to preach from the Bible? Today, it seems that more churches which are growing, especially the larger ones, have pep talks and “5 ways to make your marriage work” sermons. Jesus didn’t preach or teach on these topics. The gospel is the Good News of His payment of your debt owed because of your sins. He made that payment iN FULL so that we can accept His grace and offer of salvation once and never have to come to Him asking for salvation again.

We may need to confess our sins when we fail Him one day or another, but our salvation is secure in Him. He will in no way lose any that the Spirit calls to Himself and they accept that call. Preaching from the Word of God is the only way that many people get to hear God’s Word. It seems that today many rely on apps on their phone or tablet for scripture reading, and that’s fine but reading the Word and hearing it preached allows it to be imprinted on your mind and your heart even more.

Don’t neglect the gathering together of the brethren in worship. I know, there are always other things to do instead of going to church BUT if you have given your life to Jesus you are expected to worship Him at least one day during the week. Of course some people claim that they worship Him every day, which is good, but the disciples gathered together to worship and pray so I think we should too.

We should preach from God’s Word and worship together because the worship of His people and the praise which we give to Him, He inhabits it. Our prayers and needs are seen and heard by our Father and the Son when we are together because those prayers rise like the smoke from incense or sacrifices to the throne! Praise His Holy Name!!

Which god do you follow?


In today’s society, we have many gods. Phones, careers, cars, games, family, Facebook, all qualify to some extent as our “gods” at one time or another. Sometimes, we have more than one. We can’t leave the house or even get up in the morning without checking our phones and then we check in on Facebook. If we lose our phones, we will nearly tear the house apart trying to find this pocket computer which demands our attention every day!

Don’t make that face about this, you know that what I have written here is true because you have seen it in church or at home and certainly on the highway, although I hope not while you are driving. So, yes we have many gods which seem to claim so much of our time on a daily basis, sometimes even hourly, because I have seen people in my family at the dinner table or walking outside with the phone in front of them. They can’t seem to see past that four or five-inch screen in front of their faces.

I may be showing my age here but…how can you live like that?? There is so much more beauty and life going on around you without that screen taking all of your attention and you are missing most of it because of status updates or messages!! Whoever came up with that word certainly had the right idea to begin it with “mess”, because that is exactly what they do! Keeping up with those balloon messages and notification tones keeps many people occupied so much until they can’t pay attention to the rest of their life!

CallofDutyHow much better would our society be if we paid that much attention to the Bible? If we had to have it with us every day and read a part of it every hour of our waking day, wouldn’t our world be so much better than it is? I know we would offend many people by having our Bible out when we eat at the restaurant or when we sit to drink some coffee. But, wouldn’t our society really benefit much more in the area of morality and decent behavior if we patterned our life around God’s instructions for life, His Word?

A novel idea which, in my opinion, has come full circle and it is time for it to take its place in our society again. In schools, in the home, in business and in government, God’s Word should be consulted for all of these. Not as a state religion but as a guide to get our country back on the path which it started out on to begin with.

A friend and Savior


TrueFriendshipCould we be friends?

Sometimes people get so caught up in life and living until they forget about the friends they have. Friends put up with all sorts of behavior that even your family won’t put up with, but that doesn’t mean that you should forget them. True friends are those that even when it has been years since you last spoke to each other, you can just pick up where you left off. How many friends like that do you have?

This is the type of friend that we all have available in Jesus.

When you give your heart to Jesus, He becomes your Savior and friend but HE also introduces you to many other people who can be your friends. Your brothers and sisters in Christ! They know Him and through their spirit and your spirit you can become close friends. I am not saying this is automatic because that is not how friendships work, but it can be.

God created us all to be as close as friends no matter where we live or what our life may be like. Could you be friends with God? Of course you can, if you will just decide to follow Him and His Son, every day not just once or twice per month. Walk with Him in life, daily…even hourly, because HE gives your breath to you and your heart beats because of His grace too!

Friendship is a relationship and being a child of God, saved and sanctified by the atoning blood of Jesus, is also a relationship which needs to be a lifelong one! Your relationship with Jesus should be one which is even closer than just friends and in order for that to be, you need to learn as much as possible about Him! This can be done by reading and studying the Bible and attending a church which teaches from it.

Consider that your relationship with Jesus is a friendship. Mainly because He already knows you far better than you know Him, so pursue Him like you would if He is the only Life that you have…because after this one He truly is your Life or your Judge, it is your choice which one He will be. Choose wisely.

Nominal Christianity


Romans 10

Paul was writing to those Christians, those who accepted Jesus as their Savior. But he saw no distinction between election by the Spirit and prayer to God. Because only God who has rights to move unilaterally in human affairs can answer our prayers. Whether you truly believe it with all of your heart and soul and mind or not, God is truly in control. He doesn’t force us to do things His way, but He can intervene in the affairs of humanity to bring His purposes and His will to pass.

Considering those who don’t believe in Him, we don’t know who will respond to a sermon or to the call or touch of the Holy Spirit, so when you think of election don’t look at it as God has picked you and not this person. He wants all men to come to salvation, yet it is still up to us and our choice to believe in Him or not.

This is why, in this chapter, Paul was praying for the Jews to come to know Jesus as their Savior and we should be diligent to tell others about Him as well as pray for their salvation. It is never proper to just give up on someone because they don’t come to church or even believe like you do.

Verse 10 says: “For with the heart man believes unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation”

In verse 9, Paul wrote that with the mouth you shall confess the Lord Jesus and shall believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved. Why did I write this after verse 10? Because, you can’t confess something with your mouth that you don’t truly believe in your heart. This is why Jesus said that “out of your mouth comes defilement”.

God’s nature and the humanity of Jesus existed in Him when He was here and after He was raised to life again, this is the confession which Christians should believe in and confess to others. It is the way to Life eternal and for our hope when He comes again. The world is moving away from belief in God and has been for a long time. Even many “Christians” today only have a head knowledge of Jesus and God. They claim to know them but they only know about them, and that knowledge is not enough.

In the USA, 70% of the population claims to be Christian, but only half of that number or less says that religion is important in their lives. I mean, if only about half of that number claim that religion is important, then are they really Christians?

So how do we define a Christian? Only God knows for sure who really belongs to Him. According to the world, anyone who says they are a Christian is a Christian.

But consider, if someone on a jihad came up to you with a knife and asked that question…what would be your answer? Would you truly answer them that you are a Christian and belong to Jesus the Christ, in the face of death? I don’t know if many people would do that, none of us know for sure what our answer would be in that situation. So, what would be your answer? Will you believe in Jesus as your Savior? Our time is growing short, so don’t take too long to find the answer to that question.

Crumbs of wisdom from a cookie


Make every day your best. You will improve yourself greatly.

Meeting adversity well is the source of your strength.

Desire, like the atom, is explosive with creative force.

These were from some fortune cookies that my family got about a month or more ago. While the first two are sound advice, the third is a bit misleading. Desire is full of creative force like the atom, but it is also full of destructive force, also like the atom.

Many of our emotions have the potential to create beautiful poetry and paintings and sometimes novels. But they can also cause bitterness and hatred, jealousy and rage which may ultimately lead to murder. Some wisdom, whether from fortune cookies or from tarot cards of any type, should be taken at face value only and put away like a gun which is loaded. Those without the training and wisdom from God are not able to handle these things without being burned in the process.

Such is the problem today of so-called “Angel cards”. Everyone hears the word angel and automatically thinks that this is from God. Not necessarily. Remember, Satan once was God’s “covering Cherub”, so he can disguise himself as an angel of light. He caused one-third of God’s angels to be cast down with him, so they too can disguise themselves as a “messenger” from God.

AngelTarotCards

Don’t fall for tarot readings from a card just because it has an angel on it. It is still a form of occult sorcery and is against God. Seek Him out in all things. When your day doesn’t begin on your good foot, then seek His Wisdom in Psalms and Proverbs. Pray to your Creator to give yo

 

 

u strength for each trial which comes your way, no matter what it may be.

 

 

We live and breathe at God’s pleasure and grace, so live your life to reflect that to the world, regardless of what they may think of you! You are a child of God, especially if you have given your life to Him and asked forgiveness for your sins. Allow Him to come into your life and change you to be more like Jesus. Then your life will be so much more in tune with Him and His will for your life.

There is much wisdom contained within the Bible and it is far better and more relevant to your life than anything that you can get from a card reading.

What does God see in us?


TaketheGospeltoAllHave you ever wondered what God sees in us? Why would He send His Son to pay the price for all of us if we are so sinful from birth?

God sees the immortal soul which He placed in each of us and that soul is worth more than the wealth of the entire world, even if it were just one of us that Christ came to save! Even if it were only you, Jesus would’ve given His life on a cross to save you! That is a love that we can’t understand or imagine!

God also sees potential in each of us, the potential to be a voice which will be heard by those who will hear it. We are not all evangelists nor teachers, nor are we all to encourage and be ministers, but if you are a born-again child of the King you can be! In your own place of business or area where you are, you can be like Paul or Silas or John! You can be an ear for someone who needs one who will listen! You can be Jesus to some who may have never heard a sermon before.

The life that Jesus gives to us is one which is supposed to be used for His Kingdom and glory, not for ours. God loves each soul on this planet and He doesn’t want any to perish, but if you or your friend refuse to hear His Word and respond to it by giving your heart to Him, then your eternity will be one of suffering and pain because of your decision not because God wanted to put you there.

We make decisions every day about which clothes to wear or what shoes to put on, but what does your life mean in the grand scheme of things? It is a very deep question but it is one which we all need to find the answer to. The problem with the answer is that, for many people, the answer is usually found in things or careers or people instead of in the Person of Jesus the Christ!

We search from our teen years on for something that we feel is missing, although we can’t put our finger on it. For a long while we can’t even give it a name because we don’t know what is missing, but it feels like something isn’t right. For some people it is a problem which they solve with drugs or sex or alcohol, and when they sober up it is still missing. Sometimes it makes us feel depressed, like life just won’t be enjoyable until we find that “something” to fill the empty place inside.

It isn’t a ‘thing” at all, it is Jesus which fills that spot and until many more people realize this there will still be a drug problem and alcoholism and all of the other distractions which we use to try to “fill” that space. Learning about Him is great but asking Him to be your Lord and Savior is better! Living your life with the reality of walking with Him beside you is the next step.

This is something which many people don’t understand and it isn’t taught in many churches. When you have asked Him into your life, not just saying it but actually meaning it, He comes into your heart and He is with you every minute of every day! He wants to be involved in your life, not just on Sunday or Wednesday but every day! You and I were not created to be observers of this world, but just like the disciples, we are meant to take His message to every place that we go!

I don’t mean that we are supposed to be street preachers shouting that the end is near. Rather, we are to tell others about the Savior and what He has done for us!

New Age?


There are many different healers and mediums and those who read “angel cards” and Tarot cards who are using angels in their “practices” to fool many people into thinking they are in a ministry sanctioned by God. This is just not true! The Bible says “do not consult mediums“. These cards and the “angels” associated with them are from Satan, who can tell you all sorts of things about your life especially if you are not a Christian.

The end of the Church age is upon us and the time is drawing near when all of these who practice such “arts” will be exposed for who they are and the spirits that they use in their so-called ministry. Don’t be fooled into thinking that these people are not fooled because they are. They have been fooled into believing that they are consulting God’s angels and getting them to perform good things in your life.

Only God can command an angel to do anything, we do not have that power in this life. God can and will help you in all of your good and bad days, but you have to seek Him out. Living your life without Him and then calling on Him just when you need Him isn’t a good way to have a relationship. Jesus gave His life so that you and I could have eternity in Heaven and so that we could tell others now because people NEED to know.

Many people NEED Jesus although many of them really don’t realize it. They are looking for something but they don’t really know what at least not yet. Some try to fill that emptiness with alcohol or drugs. Some try to do it with career or family or even money. All of these are temporary and utterly useless when it comes to saving your soul, only Jesus and belief in Him can do that!

Jesus loves you and since He is the Living Word of God, He is also the Creator and sustainer of your life and mine. Seek Him in all things and follow His path and His wisdom because the wisdom of man will fail you and the religion of demons will take you exactly where they want you to be…in hell with them.

A little sumptin from Facebook


I found this on my page today and I wanted to share it wit you. So, here goes:

One Sunday morning in a small south Louisiana church, the new pastor called on one of the older deacons, Mr. Boudreaux, to lead in the opening prayer. The deacon stood up, bowed his head, and said, “Lord, I hate buttermilk.”

The pastor raised his head ever so slightly, opened one eye, and wondered where this was going. The deacon continued, “Lord, I hate lard.”

Now the pastor was really perplexed. Old Mr. Boudreaux continued, “Lord, I ain’t too crazy about plain flour either. But, I must told you sumting Lord, after you mix them all together, and bake them in a hot oven, I just love me some biscuits.”

“Lord, help us to realize dat when life gets hard, when tings come up dat we don’t like, whenever we don’t understand what You is doing, dat we need to wait and see what You are really making. After you get thru mixing and baking, it’ll probably be sumting even more better than biscuits. Amen.”

Romans 8:28

Ain’t much you can say after dat. Seek the Lord and see what He is cooking up for ya!