Category: Salvation

Distractions


I don’t have to explain this title because everyone is distracted in one way or another. Some more than others, some not so much. The real question is this: what is distracting you?

If you believe in a higher power which one do you truly believe in? Allah? Buddha? Krishna? New Age religions?

Why would you put your faith in these who have been dead for centuries? God has been here since time before time and He will be here into eternity. He is the Creator, all of these others got their “wisdom” from someone else.

We are distracted because we have lost our way trying to form our god into one that is easier to handle and believe in rather than believing in the God and Ruler of the universe, the One Who created all of it…right down to the sub molecular particles that are part of everything. God’s idea for each of us is simple and it involves our worship of Him. But that isn’t all that we will do into eternity. I’m not going to speculate about our jobs in Eternity with God. Praise will be part of it I’m sure. Worship and thankfulness will certainly be in evidence all of the time. I don’t know what Heaven will be like so I can’t tell you…but I do know that it won’t be anything like the punishment that Satan and the fallen angels who followed him will be living out into eternity. Those who chose not to believe in Jesus for their salvation and repent of their sinful lives will also be in that place of darkness and pain.

Distractions that we have now will not be in Heaven or hell. We will be totally focused on the love and the eternal happiness that we will enjoy in God’s Presence. Those who chose to follow the anti-Christ or even their own idea of “god” will feel God’s wrath during the Tribulation and into eternity in hell. How do I know they will feel it? Because Jesus said the “smoke of their torment rises forever“. You see, our souls live on into eternity whether we are in Heaven or hell and those bodies which we are given to live in also feel pain and joy and sorrow and misery but our bodies in eternity never die. Why do I bring this up? Because I want to make sure that when you stand in front of God and He asks you why you didn’t believe in Jesus for your salvation? It won’t be because I didn’t tell you if you read my posts here.

Since this disease has shut down my in-person preaching I have to tell others about Jesus here. Some will listen and believe and some won’t, but it is still my job to make sure that the message of Jesus Christ is here for you to read and make your decision. As it says in John 3:16-17: 16 For God so loved the world, as to give his only begotten Son; that whosoever believeth in him, may not perish, but may have life everlasting. 17 For God sent not his Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by him.

Please, seek Jesus Christ for your salvation while there is time. We are not guaranteed tomorrow morning so if you don’t know Him please make sure of it tonight.

What time is it?


People used to ask this a lot especially if they didn’t have a watch. But now our phones and our “smart watches” have the time and the number of steps we have made today and our heart rate and….!

So what is it time for?

It is time for us as human beings to start acting like human beings and not like animals toward each other. It is time for us to notice the world around us and realize that the complexity of this world could not happen by chance or “natural selection” as the theory goes. Everything on our planet did NOT come from one single celled organism billions of years ago.

It is also time for the world to realize exactly Who is in charge. The Democratic party? No! Is it the Communists or the Socialists? No! God is in charge of the world because not one blade of grass grows without His influence. Not even a sparrow falls to the ground without God’s knowledge of it. So, if He is watching the grass and the birds, don’t you think He cares for and keeps His attention on your life and mine? Of course He does!

The reason that we are so important to Him is because He created us to be in His image and to worship Him. Life doesn’t move and have a meaning without Him. Your life, without God in it as the Motivator and the Strength behind every move you make, would truly be without hope or meaning. God loves each of us whether we care for Him or even believe in Him. Will He save us from an eternity in hell? Yes, if we ask Jesus to come into our life and our heart and we repent of our sins and follow Him.

Living a Christian life is not hard unless you live in a country where religion is enforced and it isn’t Christianity. Some people think that it is but reading the Bible isn’t hard today because there are many translations which make it easy to read and understand. Once you become a Christian and the Holy Spirit lives within your heart, He will help you to understand the concepts of God’s Word much easier.

It is time for us to seek Jesus as our Savior and as your Savior! Because the time that we have been living in for the past two thousand years is called the church age. It hasn’t always been pretty or fun and the church has made many mistakes during that time, who hasn’t? We make mistakes every day just being ourselves. Humanity has made some really big mistakes over the few thousand years that we have been on the Earth. God will be bringing all of that to an end soon and if you would like to see what comes next you need to belong to Jesus and He needs to be your Savior.

Jesus is the Way

Be still…


Be still, and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. Psalms 46:10 KJV https://bible.com/bible/1/psa.46.10.KJV

Where are we on God’s time?


People have wondered this and pondered this for centuries and nobody really knows the answer. Some think they know, but if you have ever read some of the prophetic books from God’s Word and not taken them out of context then you know that we are very close. What do I mean by that? According to God’s Word, “a thousand years is as one day“, so we could be only a bit more than two days past Jesus’ resurrection and ascension to Heaven.

Even Jesus said that “no man knows the day or the hour, not even the Son but only the Father“. We need to be reading and studying His Word and making preparations for the departure of the church. Not any specific church but those who truly belong to God and have given their hearts and their lives to Jesus. These are the ones that will leave this Earth on that day when the trumpet of God sounds and the dead in Christ rise from their tombs and those of us who are alive and remain will be caught up (taken up) to be with Him forever.

God’s time and His timing will happen in the way that His Word says it will because He is God and He cannot lie. There are many who do not want to believe this and many who don’t put their faith and trust in Jesus for their salvation. Many of them think that because they have been in a church service for their whole lives that they have Jesus. Others think that just because they do all of the things that Christians do and attend church and all of the other outward signs of being a Christian that they are a Christian. They may be but if they haven’t truly given their heart to Jesus and begun following Him on a daily basis and not just when they need Him or on Easter and during the Christmas service…then they are fooling themselves.

Outward appearances and working in a church, even being a pastor, doesn’t make you a Christian. The Holy Spirit comes into your life and makes you see that you need Jesus in your life and in your heart and when you acknowledge His calling on your life and turn your heart over to Him, repenting of your old life, then you begin your daily walk with Jesus. It can last as long as God needs it to last. A few hours or days, maybe a few years or even decades but usually He calls you to be His witness to a specific person or people because you are the only one who may be able to reach them and turn them toward Jesus.

Why do I write these words? Because this is the only way that I can be a witness to other nations around the world. God gives me these words to say because He gave me a gift to write in ways that others can understand. I don’t have fancy seminary degrees but I am a pastor and I’ve studied the Bible every day for the last ten years. It never gets old and it always has a different message in some small way or another when I re-read it. I’ll see something or understand something about a passage the second or third time around that His Spirit didn’t reveal last year or from two years or more in the past.

I am writing this now because the time is growing short, the church age is coming to a close. When will this happen? I don’t know. It could be tonight or tomorrow. It could be next year or five years from now…maybe even ten years away but it is coming to an end. When that happens there will be lots of confusion in the world and many disasters will happen because of those who were driving or flying a plane suddenly vanish. Make sure of your destination and your salvation because things will get worse once this does happen. I pray that you will be taken on that day to be with the Lord.

Love the Lord…


How powerful is your testimony?


Our witness to the world is found in our testimony. Your testimony and mine does not have to include every deed that you have done but it is supposed to show that God has saved you from your mistakes. All of us have them. Some are worse than others but even those who aren’t old enough to have done as much as others, God can save you from all of them.

Some people tell preachers that they have been too bad or even too evil to be considered as a convert to Christianity. There are no such people! God has accepted those who have been murderers, thieves, drug dealers and drug users, harlots and prostitutes and He will accept you as a child of His through Jesus Christ because you can reach someone that no one else can.

Your testimony is powerful enough to bring someone into the family of God and it is possible that you are the only person that can reach that person. They may belong to another church or they may not go to church but if you can talk to them, God will give you the words that can bring them into the family. It may even be someone who has known you for a long time. They know your past and what you did in years past before God changed your heart to serve Him. That person doesn’t exist if you have put away your sinful life and turned to follow Jesus. You cannot make them see the change, although they may see it but they don’t want that change. Sometimes they will reject your testimony because of pride or anger at you because of some slight or emotional hurt that you caused many years ago.

Ask the Lord to melt their hearts so that they can receive His message for their salvation because it may be that only He and His Word can do what your testimony and your changed life cannot do. Even Jesus could do few miracles in His home town because they looked on Him as the Son of Joseph and they had watched Him grow up with His brothers and sisters. They said “he’s the carpenter’s son, where did he learn these things?”

God has used so many people in the past and He still uses circumstances and problems and people today to get people who have rejected Him to turn back to Him. He used many of Israel’s enemies to chastise them when they were disobeying His commandments. He raised up a ruler in Egypt to oppress the people as slaves so that He could judge Egypt and their gods. God can use your life and your testimony to change people’s lives today as well. It may be something you say or something that you do that could cause them to seek God for their life’s troubles and their salvation. It may be something that you write or a sermon or an inspiring post or link on Facebook that gets their attention and turns them toward God.

Only God knows how you will accomplish His will in your life and it may not happen until your death or afterward but God can accomplish His will through you in some way to bring others to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ.

Go and tell others and make disciples of them


This is what we’re called and commanded to do as followers of Jesus Christ. Go into the world and take His message with you to those who need it because everyone does.

Always on time


You know someone who is always late or always early everyone knows someone who fits at least those descriptions. Then there are some who fall in between those as well. But when it comes to finding a Savior or leaning on God for your provisions, whatever they may be, He is always on time. As long as you recognize that it is His time and not your idea of “on time”.

Why do I bring this up? Because we are living in a world that is unpredictable. We have no idea when things will turn around and get better or even if they will get better. Our life may be one doctor visit from a really bad day that leads to something that we don’t want to hear right now. There could be a wreck this afternoon while our loved ones are trying to get home from work. Hopefully it won’t be them involved in the wreck but it could be. We aren’t given or guaranteed a safe and happy life, with or without Jesus.

God watches over every part of your life, especially when your heart belongs to Jesus but He also watches over those who haven’t made that decision yet as well. Some might tell you that God doesn’t care about you until you ask Jesus into your life but it is God’s grace and mercy and His Holy Spirit which touches your heart and makes you realize that you actually need Jesus in the first place. It isn’t the preacher or even the sermon being preached that gets your attention. It is God’s touch on your heart and soul which lets you know that you are a sinner and if you died on the way home without Jesus, you will go to hell.

It is a very thin line that separates us from eternity or if you want to think of it in wintertime terms then it is very thin ice that you are standing on in this life. If God has a plan for you and a job for you to do for Him then you will be called one day soon. Because there isn’t much time left for us to be in this world. Too many of the things which are supposed to happen (prophecies) have already happened or are happening now and are bringing us closer to the day and the hour of the Trumpet of God calling the dead in Christ to life eternal and those who are alive who belong to Him will be caught up to the clouds with them (the Rapture of the Church).

Believe it and live or choose not to believe and live through the Tribulation, if you can. I have been accused of trying to scare people away from hell, and I plead guilty as charged. Hell is a hot and fiery place of torment where you go for eternity if you have rejected Jesus as your Savior during this life. It is not a quick “poof and that’s it”, the Bible says that the “smoke of their torment rises forever” because God did not create hell for humanity to live out eternity in. It was meant to be a place where Satan and his followers would be punished for their choices but since even the refusal of Jesus and the salvation that belief in Him brings is a choice for Satan then you will live out your eternity with him in hell.

Choose life everlasting in heaven with God now while there is time because when you draw your last breath in this life, you will open your eyes in eternity and in front of God as your Judge depending upon your choice now, today. Believe in Jesus for your Salvation because there will not be a chance to make that choice if you die before you make it.

Whom do you serve?


We hear a bit of wisdom from Jesus’ own words many times and we don’t even realize where it came from or who said it. It is mentioned in movies and in books. It is used for many purposes, good and bad. Yet it was meant as a way that Jesus was making a point to His enemies when they were trying to catch Him with a politically charged question. They asked Him, “Teacher, should we pay taxes to Caesar?” He then asked a question or two of His own. “Show me the coin. Whose likeness is this?” Of course it was Caesars likeness and Jesus knew this. Then He told them flatly: “Therefore render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Matthew 22:21).

Each of us owes a debt to Jesus and to God Himself that we could never pay and it concerns our salvation and the price that was paid for it. Even if you have never given your heart to Jesus or asked Him to cleanse you and make you a disciple of His, He paid the price for your sins. When you feel the touch of the Holy Spirit in your life and on your heart, it is Jesus Who is knocking on the door to your heart. You might tell me or someone else that God wouldn’t accept me because I’ve fought with that Spirit for a long time, so long in fact that I barely feel or hear it anymore. If you feel a nudge or a very slight touch from Him I pray that you will answer that call, that feeling, His touch the next time that you feel it.

God can use your talents for His Kingdom. Even if you feel that they don’t amount to much, God can change your direction and give you the ability to be His watchman or His prophet. He used many men in the past and He is still giving out abilities to those who will answer His call. We may not see miracles happen when we want them to but they will happen when the time is right and it fits His time. Jesus said that “faith the size of a mustard seed” can move mountains. God can give you more than that but your faith still has to be turned on by your belief in the Creator of the universe. Faith to move a mountain won’t lift a grain of sand if you don’t believe.

God has been in our past and He is here today. Watching and seeking anyone who will hear His Word and take it to heart and believe what is there in the Word, the Bible. Many people in government and in some other organizations work very hard trying to take any reference to the Bible out of public view. If they would realize that God loves them and seek to do what it says in the Bible…taking the good news to everyone who will believe, with the same passion that they use trying to get rid of it the whole world would have a revival of faith in the One True God of the Bible.

But…because of the time that we are living in at the end of the church age, there are so many false teachers who are preaching and teaching doctrine that sounds good and it may even have some references to the Bible in their doctrine, but it has been twisted out of context. Scripture has been used by thousands in this manner over the centuries. Taken as one verse and used as a doctrine or a rallying cry but when a verse is used like this its power is twisted and can be used to enslave people or to turn their beliefs toward something or someone who is not who they say they are.

I pray that everyone who is seeking to know Jesus will seek Him in His Word, Old and New Testament, because He is there and we carry His image within us even when we were sinners. We should all consider that fact and seek to be worthy of His image until the day that He comes to take the church home with Him.

Can God use me for His purposes?


Working for God and by extension Jesus as well is the most important job and, besides being a parent, is the most rewarding job that you can have. Does it pay well? Not in this life but when you repent of your sins and you’ve given your heart to Jesus, tell others about your Savior! God reward for His apostles and children is eternal life in heaven and being able to walk into a city where the streets are paved with pure gold.

He is the Creator and He knew you and me before we were born. Did He know that we would give our hearts to Him? Yes and He knows what you are capable of doing for Him and with Him in your life. When God knew you in the womb, He knew your capabilities. He knew then and now what you are capable of accomplishing for yourself and for His Kingdom. Just as He knew each and every person in the Old Testament and what they could do and would do if they would willingly follow His directions and do the things that He tells them to do.

God want us to obey His commands and directions and when we become His children by giving our lives to Him we should do this out of gratitude for His love. It was because of His love for us that Jesus came and paid the price for us on the cross. Jesus did this because of His love for each one of us and because He knew that we would be useful to Him and His Kingdom. Why? Because each of us has at least one person that we can reach for Jesus that nobody else can reach. Some of us may be able to tell many people about His love for us and what He did for our salvation.

The point is that in the past God has used a murderer and a pagan idol worshiper for His purposes. He used a prostitute and a gentile woman for his purposes. He used a donkey that spoke to his master for His purposes and He used a fish to carry Jonah to a city called Nineveh so that the people might be spared from the wrath of God. He is the Creator and He can use your talents even if you don’t think you have any.

Give your heart to Jesus and give your life and your talent to God’s Kingdom. He will show you what to do and where to go and it may just be down the street or across the hallway but He knows that you can reach that person and show them that He loves them too.