Tag: Christianity

Life….


I have written a post with this name before, but not one that has the same message. “In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” John 1:4,5

Jesus is our Life, our eternity and the Life that takes us into it, so why are we ignoring and ridiculing each other and the message that is in the Bible? Because many people just don’t want to hear the message and the hope that is contained in it and in the message which Jesus brought to us. We need it…all of us, but there are many who think that there are too many rules or they look at our religion as one that has caused oppression, slavery, murder, and many other abominations toward life.

Religion has caused many of these evils in the past, and regardless of the religion that was involved many of the evils committed were laid at the feet of Christianity. Christianity is a religion and many people do practice it under the guise of different denominations but being a Christian is a LIFESTYLE in which you live and walk with Jesus DAILY, not just on Sunday or Wednesday. There is a huge difference between religion and those who practice it in all of its forms and a true Christian.

Just as there is a difference between people who practice Islam and those who actually live by the good teachings of it and those Islamists who practice and live by a form that their Prophet would not recognize were he here.

God, not Allah, is the answer to the world’s problems today but many people don’t want to hear that because they believe that they have the answer and their’s is the only answer regardless of your beliefs! You can become radical about anything…money, power, religion, or any of a dozen other things but being radical about it doesn’t make it the Truth of God!

Why am I saying this today? Because the world is quickly moving in a direction which will lead many people toward a destination which is not the one that they are hoping for. Many religions in our world today take you down a path that is easy to walk and with many things promised to you, if you will just give your life to the teachings of the prophet or the leader or the doctrine being taught. If those doctrines and wisdom don’t come from God and His Word…RUN! Get away from that “church” or “temple” because they are teaching Satanic wisdom and doctrine, and you will pay eternally for it!

Life only comes through the Creator of Life, Jesus the Creator. He is called the Door, the Way and the Life in Scripture and it is through Him that we have access to eternity. Not with our own abilities or our accomplishments, even though we are given those and the ability to accomplish them by Him. You and I cannot work our way into Heaven. It is gained by faith and belief in Jesus. Belief in Jesus comes to each of us by our faith and faith comes from hearing the Word of God, whether you read it yourself or you attend a church which teaches from the Bible!

Life is not just an existence and it is not a drudgery and terrible way of living, regardless of where you live or the system of beliefs that you live by. Life is truly what comes to you from knowing Jesus and His Love in your life, daily! Seek Him out in your life so when this life comes to an end, your Life in Him will truly begin!

The Preeminent Christ!


Have you ever heard a preacher call Jesus that? I don’t believe that I have and I have been going to church for about fifty years (although I don’t remember much of those first few years). Jesus was elevated to His position when He returned to Heaven and sat down on the right of His Father. Why doesn’t anyone preach this or tell about Him being in this position today? Because it is not in the Bible, I believe.

Yes, it does say that He occupies the right hand side of the throne but we never hear about what that includes. Why? Because it would be mostly speculation on our part. Jesus never explicitly told His disciples that He would be in control of all of creation, it is just assumed because He is the Creator along with God! It seems that nobody considered that He would be anymore than a man, even if He is the Son of God.

Consider this: He is already on the throne of David even though He is not on Earth yet. He is in control of all of creation because He is the Creator, the Living Word of God. He loves each of us with a love that goes far beyond anything that we can conceive or imagine, even if we haven’t accepted Him as Savior yet.

He is the I AM! He is part of the Trinity! He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords! He is Alive and He is RISEN. Our Savior and Lord, so why is it that His name and the church which began from His disciple’s going out to tell about Him causes so much strife and problems? The “church” from ages past, which sent Crusaders into Jerusalem and lands occupied by the followers of Islam, is not the church that I belong to. Though many people seem to associate Christians with it and lump us all together as one big group. We are so fractured and splintered into denominations and beliefs which don’t follow all of the teachings of Christ or have changed those teachings to reflect what each one wants to believe. How can we be so split up like this? The Bible is still the Word of God. It is still the same whether it is in a different language or translation. So what happened to the Christ and to Jesus and the message that He taught before He went to be at the right hand of the Father?

The scriptures and the words contained in them are still the Word of God, so why can’t the church act like a unified body of believers?

Because of our own beliefs and individual ideas about what should and should not be taught in church. It seems that church squabbles and divisions start because a few people don’t like the sermon which was preached last week or last month. Then, they go and stir up trouble by finding a few more people who agree with them. Pretty soon they have enough people that they can demand that the preacher leave or they can go start another church with another pastor. Who is behind all of this in-fighting and bickering? Satan.

When he was defeated at the cross, he purposed to tear the church apart by quarrels and in-fighting and he and his demons and principalities have done a very good job of it over the past two thousand years or so. The church has splintered into hundreds of denominations with different doctrines. Some which follow the teachings of Jesus and some which don’t recognize His deity at all. It is no wonder that there are so many people who are confused and have decided not to believe what our message says. All that can be done is to keep telling people about Jesus and His teachings and that He is the only way to salvation because that is His message. Don’t add to it and don’t take anything away from it and let the Spirit do its work in the world. That is the job that we have as His church.

No violence, no argument and no pushing “religion” on anyone, just tell people about His love and that He died for them so that they might live…forever.

In His Service.

Why all of the violence?


We see it and hear about it on the news every day. It is in the movies and TV shows. So why are we so enthralled with violent games and TV shows? Honestly…I don’t know. I don’t understand the love of violence, but it has been in our culture for a very long time it seems. We have had many wars in the past and if you go back just for the lifetime of America, we have been involved in many.

So, why can’t we just get along? Is it pride or arrogance that keeps us from having peace? Is it our religious differences between cultures which causes most of this madness? Is there a solution to all of the killing and violence?

All of those questions are valid and the answer to some of them is yes we can get along, yes it is pride and arrogance that causes some, if not all, of the divisions in the world. The religious differences have been around for many hundreds of years and in some cases it really is our problems with tolerance that causes our hatred and violence between people of different faiths. The solution to these problems is not one which will be accepted by all though. There are three faiths which center around God in the world and they have a lot of cultural baggage between them. Radical beliefs which polarize them because of a minority claiming them as beliefs which they want to force upon most, if not all, of the world.

It has been this way for many years. A minority that holds radical views of their religion which doesn’t reflect the beliefs of the majority but they get noticed because of their attacks on others and their voices are usually the loudest too. Even Christianity has some radical congregations or groups which teach views which most Christians look on as not representing the church at all. The solution to our violent problem will not come from us though, it will come from Jesus Himself.

There has to be a change in the way that we live our lives and how we serve others and the church. That change has to begin within each of us first. Speeches don’t do it, revivals which last for a day or two won’t get it done. If the change is not brought into each person’s heart by Jesus and a commitment to Him then there will be no possibility of change which will last. Talking about it won’t help, listening to tapes won’t help but the Holy Spirit can change each of us from the inside out.

Seek Him out while He may be found.

Too much information….


Everywhere that we go today, whether it is to work or school or to a favorite store or even a restaurant, we are assaulted with advertising of some kind. In our email and text messages, sometimes we get sales calls from people and companies which we might never have had a relationship at all! We watch videos and read posts on twitter and Facebook and many other social media sites…for what? The information? The news, if there is such a thing anymore, is old five minutes after we see it or hear it and we move on to something else. Have you ever wanted to get away from all of this connectedness? I certainly would like to, although I wouldn’t be able to keep this site up if I did. But, it would be like a vacation just to have a few days without cell service and Internet. I would likely go through some withdrawal for the first day or so, but I think I could adjust and cope with it.

Life today is so covered in information until it is causing stress when and where there was no stress before. Even children feel stressed by it today, because of too much information and the fact that it is so pervasive in our society today. There have been plenty of theories about doomsday scenarios with electromagnetic pulses and such. If such a thing did happen over a country like the USA, there would be many people who would likely have a heart attack because they couldn’t check in with their friends and family every few minutes! I have heard some people say that something needs to happen to push us back into life as it was in the nineteenth century with no phones, no electricity, no food unless you grew it yourself, no milk unless you had a cow or a goat that gave milk. Sounds like fun doesn’t it? Not really. More than half of the people of America would die if this happened. Some because of violence, some because of starvation, mostly because of boredom on top of the other two!

There was a speech given once by a great President where he was consecrating a battlefield. One that had come on our soil because of stubbornness and laziness and the ideas of a privileged few that wouldn’t give up their way of life to set men free. Here is that speech, not because it is a light in a dark world but because the man who wrote it and gave it was:

“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation, so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that our nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

The ideas that Abraham Lincoln espoused in this speech which we do still remember, if you have taken American history that has not been altered, come from a faith in God because even though slavery was OK in the Bible it wasn’t supposed to be life-long. Unless the slave loved you and didn’t want to be set free, they were supposed to go free in seven years. All debt was cancelled and land was returned to the original owner every fifty years. Life, given to us by God and His grace, is a precious commodity not to be used or squandered. We should honor it and celebrate it, even if someone doesn’t believe the same doctrine that you do or live according to the “book” that you do. We are created in His image and created equal in His sight, regardless of our skin color or religion and that is the code…the doctrine that we should live by!

 

What is happening?


The world is burning and many people are applauding the fact that it is, why? No, it isn’t literally burning yet, but the fires which fuel the hatred and violence which precedes the end times which are taught in the Bible and in the Koran are burning and getting hotter. Believe it or not, call me crazy if you wish, but the  problems that are in this world are here because of sin, period! There was an exchange of a BBC show about sin and other topics and I have given the link to it from theblaze.com. In essence the host of the show is calling the Truth in God’s Word bigoted and hateful. It hurts when you find the truth of scripture that applies to your life. It hurts when you realize that some of the sinful things that you condone and agree with are shown to be the sins which God abhors.

Preachers don’t teach bigotry, we teach and preach the Truth of the Living God! If you don’t like it, don’t come to church, don’t read God’s Word at all! But…if you are looking for the truth and the way to live your life by God’s laws and God’s ways, then by all means learn about Him! God loves those on Earth, each of us, but He doesn’t condone nor approve of our sinful lifestyles or the sins which we live in every day! I may be a preacher but I am a sinner too. I don’t claim to be pure or holy, the only righteousness that I have has been imputed to me through Jesus because it is His righteousness that I have in my heart!

No, I am not perfect in fact I am far from it. Not one person on Earth is righteous enough to get into Heaven on their own and whether you agree with me or not, you know this to be true! God provided us with a Savior through Jesus and all that we have to do to have His righteousness is to believe in Him and give our lives to Him through faith. No amount of works or actions on our part will ever help us get into Heaven because He did all of the work necessary and it is our responsibility to either accept it or not. God doesn’t send anyone to Hell, you do that by rejecting Him and His love for you.

Is it possible to commit an unpardonable sin?


The point of no return is the same as an unpardonable sin, when you die there is no return and if you have refused the grace of God all of your life there is no pardon available! You don’t get a second chance after death because you have had many opportunities in this life. What can you do? What will you do with your eternity now?

For many people, that decision has already been made and there is no changing it. For others there is still hope. If you still breathe and walk this earth you can change and seek out your Creator, today. Tomorrow is still ahead and yesterday is already gone, consider this before you go to sleep tonight. Like the farmer in the story who said, “I have enough. I will build more barns and take life easy. Eat, drink and be merry and take life as it comes. And God said, you fool, tonight your soul is required of thee.” Granted, this is a paraphrase of the scripture (Luke 12:19,20), but you get the idea.

Your life and mine are not guaranteed. We don’t have a certificate which says “you will have 58.5 years before you die” when we are born. Even in the Bible it says that man has appointed three score and ten or seventy years, anything beyond this is due to God’s grace alone. Yet, even that isn’t guaranteed. Consider that you live X number of years, after this there is eternity in one place or another. Which one will you live in during that time?

Consider this the next time you are in a close call on the highway. Why do I emphasize this today, now? It is truly because our lives are just a puff of smoke compared to eternity and whether you believe it or not, that is where you will spend most of your actual life. Seventy years is not a long time compared to even one million years, it is just a dot on a very long line. Even one million years is only a dot on a line that never ends! That is why I am speaking this way today because your eternal life will be either in the presence of God in Heaven or it will be with the demons and Satan and everyone else who refused God’s gift of grace through Jesus Christ our Lord.

It is your choice. God doesn’t require it of you nor does He force you to serve Him, ever! You cannot force anyone to truly love you and if it is forced, it isn’t love at all. It is done out of fear and that kind of devotion is NOT what God seeks!! God is not Allah and Allah is not God! Radical thinking, huh? The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is not Allah, it is Yahweh Elohim! Seek Him out and learn of the One True God because beside Him there is no other!

Amen

How much more?


What has to happen in our country or in the world to wake people up? How much more will have to be taken away in the form of losing freedoms or rights? How much more will we willingly give up to the government or to our own view of life, freedom, and happiness? Why are we willing to make ourselves into slaves of the government like Israel and the Egyptians did when famine took over their lands? Are we really more like sheep than we thought?

The answers to these questions are answers which we really don’t know. The media, the news outlets, the governments of the world are all clueless in answering these questions because they simply don’t know the answer and they don’t know where to look for it. Is the answer to all of this in God’s Word? Yes, most of these questions could be answered by people following the wisdom contained in the Bible. I mean REALLY following it, daily, in our jobs and at home 24/7!

Would we be willing to do that? The short answer is unfortunately NO! Christian faith has taken a huge hit in terms of people willing to follow it over the years. I am not speaking of those who claim to be Christians, I am speaking of those who really are committed and live their lives in God’s presence with prayer, meditation on His Word DAILY! Not just once per week and certainly not just on holidays! When you try to nail down those who are TRULY committed to Jesus, the number of Christians who fall into that number drops dramatically. Most polls show that out of the world’s population there is approximately 25% that claims Christianity as their faith, but if they are truthful and look at those who committed to following Him daily, I believe that number would be closer to ten percent.

True, this is just my own opinion and I don’t have any facts or polls to back this up with so don’t jump on me because of this. I have only been a pastor for a little more than four years but it seems that the number of Christians who would still claim it even in the face of death threats is likely less than the ten percent, but this was prophesied over two thousand years ago so it shouldn’t be surprising. It is just disheartening and depressing, but God knew and knows who will be His and who will turn from Him. So, how many more will turn away? How much more will we lose to technology or to the attractions in the world?

The real answer is: Only God knows for sure!

We have given up our family time together, we rarely meet with our friends to talk and go over our lives together, the world is crashing in on every aspect of personal life, like waves on the seashore and like the sands of that seashore, we seem to be powerless to stop it. The sad part of it is that we have done this to ourselves! We have allowed it to happen and the more it encroaches on our lives it seems that we are willing to just allow it to happen even more.

Please, turn to the Bible and to faith in Jesus! Getting closer to Him and the wisdom in God’s Word is the only hope that we truly have!

The significance of th cross


Not much more to say, other than “Amen!”thecross

Is your life yours?


This is what we think of our lives mostly…that we own it, that it belongs to us and we can do whatever we want with it. If you are not a Christian and you don’t believe in God nor have you given your life to Jesus and asked Him into your heart, then maybe you do own your life. Unless your parents do or your wife or your boss at work does. They do have a certain amount of “ownership” of your time and your life, up to a point. Our life, as we live it, is ours to do with as we please…until we realize that we need Jesus in our life and in our heart. Then we are His.

Why do I say it this way? Because He purchased us with His blood, His death and His resurrection! He paid all of our debts in regards to sin and we are His creation because He knew us before we were ever born into this world! Our purpose in this life, our REAL purpose is to serve Him in whatever way we can. Whether it is as a missionary or a teacher or a preacher or an evangelist. Our work for His Kingdom is to tell others about the gospel, the Good News of His gift of salvation! You cannot earn this gift nor buy it with any amount of work that you claim to do for Him, particularly if the work is done without Him in your life and heart.

Everything that is done prior to repentance from your sinful life and asking Him to cleanse you and make you a new creature if Him has the same value as garbage. In other words…it is worth NOTHING in relation to eternity! Life in eternity is only granted by belief in, and living your days with, Jesus. Remember the story about the thief on the cross? He didn’t have a chance to be baptized and receive the Holy Spirit nor did he have a chance to witness to many people, he only asked Jesus to remember him when He came into His Kingdom. Jesus said to him, “Today, you will be with Me in Paradise.” Because of his belief in Who Jesus was and is, his faith and belief in Jesus saved him from an eternity of punishment. He recognized the Messiah when very few did at that point.

Truly, because of God’s grace toward us, we belong to Him whether we have accepted His grace and mercy through Jesus or not. The unpardonable sin is that we go through life, having heard sermons or read the Bible and know the way of salvation and yet refuse it, sometimes you or someone you know has felt the pull or the voice of the Holy Spirit and just walked away. That is the unpardonable sin which will not be forgiven, especially if you die without ever repenting and turning to Jesus! Think about this, seek Him in His Word, listen for the Spirit speaking to your heart, pray about it and ask Jesus to come into your life and change you. Then live your life as a testimony to Him and about Him until you are called to Heaven by death or by the Angels. Just don’t wait like Satan wants you to, because his lie is that you have plenty of time yet your time may be up tonight or tomorrow!

Changing times…


The world and everything in it is changing. The problems which we have to deal with, the good and the bad things which happen every day rarely give any of us a break in our lives. How can we handle so much change from day-to-day? With prayer and seeking God it is possible but there are many people in the world who either refuse to do that or they just don’t believe in God in the first place. Have you ever noticed the stars or the pictures taken by the Hubble telescope? Our universe is not an accident! The stars and their galaxies were placed by God in their orbits and in their places so that we could wonder at His power and majesty.

This world that we live on was put here specifically for our benefit with just the right amount of oxygen and nitrogen to sustain life. This didn’t happen by accident either. The placement of the outer planets and the comets were planned and placed for God’s majesty and for our wonderment. Why? Because we cannot explain these things away with mathematics and calculus. Philosophy and mankind’s intellect can’t explain these collections of stars and gases nor can it explain our own chemical make-up. No amount of education can explain the chemical signals which produce emotions like love or hate or rage and we never will!

They are out of our grasp but one day we will know as we are known by Him. How do I know that? Because it is in His Word! God said so and the world and everything except us was formed by His Word. He specifically came to the garden and formed man from the ground, with His Hands not by His Word, that is why we are fearfully and wonderfully made!!

One of the most worrisome beliefs that I hear about and read about today is that there are many (only 2 to 5% of the population) who either don’t believe in God, are not associated with any religion or who just choose not to associate with an organized religion. That is fine and you are entitled to your opinion, but don’t expect me or any other believer to stop believing in Jesus and the Bible just because you don’t! As I have stated many times before, disbelief or not believing in something or Someone doesn’t get rid of them!

Yes, our culture has changed drastically in many ways over the past fifty or sixty years, but God is still real and so is Satan. Two opposing sides trying to either save mankind or drag as many into hell as possible, the choice is ours. We are not automatically damned to hell, unless that is our choice, and we don’t get a free pass into heaven either. Many do believe that if a child dies before they are old enough to make a rational and conscious choice then they do get to make that choice in the presence of God. Whether that is true or not, I don’t know because it isn’t revealed in the Bible.

Change is coming soon, though I am not sure of the severity or magnitude of that change but it is coming.