Category: Salvation

Augustine…


Augustine was an early church father/preacher who wrote and taught many things in his lifetime. One of the opening sentences of his writings is this paragraph of The Confessions of Augustine, which acknowledges, “You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our hearts are restless until they rest in you.” (Confessions, 1,1.) Only in God is found the final happiness of any person.

This is a teaching and a truth I have written about myself that I learned through the Holy Spirit as I read the Bible over the last ten years. God reveals His wisdom and truth to us as we read and study His Word…if we seek His wisdom and ask the Holy Spirit to teach us. I am not bragging that I learned this because of Augustine but that it surprised me today as I was reading about him. God’s Word is the best book of Wisdom in the world because it comes from Him. There is no “human wisdom” contained in it because all that is written in it was inspired by the Holy Spirit.

Seek to know Jesus as your Savior through your study of His Word and ask Him to come into your heart and cleanse you while you study. He will give you the joy and peace that you have been searching for that can’t be found in schools or jobs or in any endeavor that we engage in daily.

I would study more


If you didn’t need sleep, what would you do with all the extra time?

If I didn’t need to sleep, I would read the Bible every night. Reading it is the only way to know God’s will. You can’t know Him or His will without reading it and asking God to show you what He wants to say to you. I’ve read it every year since 2011 and I find new information every time. Sometimes a verse will tell you one thing and the next time you read it there will be a little different bit of information.

That doesn’t mean that God’s Word is not true, it is the Holy Spirit that teaches you and me when we read it prayerfully. Seeking God’s wisdom is the only reason to read the Bible. That’s what I would do with the extra time if I didn’t need sleep.

Trust and Truth…


In the world that all of us live in today, these two words are hard to find and even harder to know if you can or even know either one. The media doesn’t really lend itself in either area and our government hasn’t had our trust or given us the truth in so long that I’m not sure they even know how.

The only real Truth is in God’s Word. Since it is God’s Word we can trust it and Him to be truthful in His promises and in His covenants as well. I am putting this out here to get some other opinions so let me have them, good or bad.

God has plans for your life


My family


Who are your current most favorite people?

I’m not talking about just my wife and my son. My daughter in law has been a wonderful wife to my son. My in-laws are wonderful, loving people. But my family doesn’t end there. The people I go to church with are also my family. We worship together, we cry with each other when there’s sorrow and we praise the Lord when a prayer is answered. These are my favorite people. I pray that you have some like them too.

My Dachshunds


What are your favorite animals?

I found out 18 years ago that they are the most loyal and loving of companions I want in my life, besides my wife of 31 years 🥰.

Why did Jesus die?


According to the Bible and the prophecies He was/is Immanuel…God came here to be one of us! He was a human for the life that He lived while He lived with His human parents. Was He God? Yes, He was and is God the Son. He laid His divinity down and became one of His creations, the people that He loved and still loves more than His life.

While He was here in the flesh of mankind He felt everything that we feel during our lives. He felt hunger, thirst, sadness, weariness, love and anger. Yet He did not sin in all of His human feelings. He did this not because He had to but because He LOVED us! This is the same reason that He died on the cross and rose again on the third day! I pray that anyone who needs a Savior will seek to know Him while there is time to call on Him and then answer His call that comes back to us. He wants to know you, even though He already does. He wants to be involved in your life daily so please don’t push His call away like some telemarketer.

Mountains


Beach or mountains? Which do you prefer? Why?

My reason is that they are more beautiful and not quite as crowded during the summer.

Are you ready for eternity?


Can you keep these completely? Have you considered that God wrote these on stone tablets and gave them to Moses? Have you ever considered that GOD is the Creator of EVERYTHING? That is the Person that you pray to and worship every Sunday morning! When we pray we are speaking to our Creator and most people just shrug their shoulders like it’s no big deal. Why?

Jesus came because He wants a relationship with you, me, and everyone who will give their hearts to Him. He knows when you will follow Him but why do so many of you wait? You don’t know if you are going to wake up in the morning! None of us knows how many days we may have left and it is only in this life that we can come to know Jesus as our Savior. Once you die, that’s it! You don’t get a second chance. 

Once, I was accused of trying to scare people into giving their hearts to Jesus and I’ll admit that I tried but only God can bring you to the point of knowing that you NEED Him. The Holy Spirit has to touch your heart and bring you to the knowledge of your sin and that without Jesus as your Savior, you will go to hell. Some of my friends from years ago, when I was a firefighter, said they would have the fire put out by the time the rest of us got there. No, they won’t! There is no light in hell, only heat and an absence of God’s Spirit and presence. There is no way that there will be a party in hell the way many people used to say. There is no water in hell either!

Remember the parable that Jesus told about the rich man and Lazarus? The rich man asked Father Abraham to let Lazarus come and just dip his finger in some water and put one drop on his tongue to cool it in the heat. Hell was made for Satan and his demons because they wanted to rule in Heaven. It was not made for mankind but Satan likes to trick people into thinking that it doesn’t exist or that they have plenty of time to make peace with God. The only peace you can make with God is by accepting Jesus as your Savior!

Your life here is short compared to even one thousand years. Imagine living in your eternal body in hell. Your body can feel the heat and the separation from God and at that point, you know that you can’t get out of hell. The pain that you will feel will be from your separation from God and it will be from the heat of the lake of fire too because your body cannot die even though you will want the pain to stop. 

The only remedy that will keep you from going to hell is by giving your life and your heart to Jesus. There is no other path and no other remedy for your sins. Jesus paid the price to buy your soul with His blood and He paid for all of your sins with it as well. All you have to do is accept Him as your Savior and repent of your sins, then follow Him until He comes again. The period of grace for this world is drawing to an end and His coming could be at any time. Don’t wait until it is too late.

Why am I writing this? Because there are many people in the world who know about Jesus and about God BUT God doesn’t know them. These people have likely been in a church nearly every time the doors were open. They’ve heard the sermons and some may even take part in Bible studies on a weekly basis. Yet they haven’t truly given their hearts to Jesus and allowed Him to change their lives to do the will of God. 

If you are one of these “so-called Christians” or if you just have doubts about your relationship with Jesus, I implore you to seek Him in the Bible, read the books of Romans and John, pray about what you are reading and ask Him to show you the condition of your heart. Make the right decision to give your life to Jesus so your eternity will not be like the rich man in hell needing water but there is no water in hell.

Give thanks to Him