Tag: God the Father

Are you the prodigal son or the one serving at home?


The parable of the prodigal son is a moving one which teaches us about God’s love and His willingness to forgive us no matter what we have done. The word “prodigal” is a word not used much in God’s Word. It’s basic meaning is wasteful, wanton, especially regarding money. It indicates the type of person who wastes their money on things that aren’t worth much, just plain reckless spending.

In Luke chapter fifteen, Jesus is teaching and there were tax collectors and sinners listening. There were also scribes and teachers of the Law in the crowd too. They were judging Jesus by the company that He was keeping: “This man eats with sinners and tax collectors!” It was for them that He told this parable.

Luke 15: 11-32:

11 And he said, “There was a man who had two sons. 12 And the younger of them said to his father, ‘Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.’ And he divided his property between them. 13 Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living. 14 And when he had spent everything, a severe famine arose in that country, and he began to be in need. 15 So he went and hired himself out to[a] one of the citizens of that country, who sent him into his fields to feed pigs. 16 And he was longing to be fed with the pods that the pigs ate, and no one gave him anything.

17 “But when he came to himself, he said, ‘How many of my father’s hired servants have more than enough bread, but I perish here with hunger! 18 I will arise and go to my father, and I will say to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. 19 I am no longer worthy to be called your son. Treat me as one of your hired servants.”’ 20 And he arose and came to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion, and ran and embraced him and kissed him. 21 And the son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against heaven and before you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.’[b] 22 But the father said to his servants,[c] ‘Bring quickly the best robe, and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet. 23 And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. 24 For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ And they began to celebrate.

25 “Now his older son was in the field, and as he came and drew near to the house, he heard music and dancing. 26 And he called one of the servants and asked what these things meant. 27 And he said to him, ‘Your brother has come, and your father has killed the fattened calf, because he has received him back safe and sound.’ 28 But he was angry and refused to go in. His father came out and entreated him, 29 but he answered his father, ‘Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!’ 31 And he said to him, ‘Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32 It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.’”

In these passages and in this parable we see the son who essentially has declared his father dead. He wanted what was to come to him even before his father had died. Kind of sounds like our society today, “I want it NOW!” Not many days pass before he takes off into the world (the far country) where he spent his inheritance on women and drink and parties. While doing this, he had many “friends”.  Running away from God’s authority to do whatever we wish to do, like many of us have done or maybe are doing now?

But when the money ran out and it was gone, those “friends” disappeared and a famine came to the land where he was. He had no money left and couldn’t afford to eat and began to feel in want, so he hired himself to a citizen there in order to be able to survive. He was sent into the field to feed pigs, which to a Jew is at the very bottom of the barrel. Pigs are not even given a name in the Hebrew language, they are just called “the other thing or animal”.

At this point he was so hungry, that even the pods that he was feeding the pigs with were looking very appetizing  because no one gave him anything to eat. When he came to his senses, he decided that he would go home and ask his father if he could just be a servant, because even his father’s servants had enough to eat. His father was looking, hoping that his son would come home and when he saw him, he ran to greet him.

In the Middle East, this was a very undignified way for a father to act because a man over thirty years of age doesn’t “run” anywhere. This one did. He listened to his son’s repentance and the question of being a slave or a servant and said “Nonsense, bring a robe and put shoes on his feet and a ring on his finger”. His father did not take him back as a servant, he was fully restored to his previous place. Of course the older brother was offended and the sibling rivalry came roaring back, as you can read in the story.

The point of the story is this, God will forgive you regardless of the insult or the sin, no matter how bad you may think that you have been. God’s grace covers every sin, no matter the size. He loves us with a love that we can’t comprehend, all that we have to do is repent and ask Him to forgive us. Turn away from what you were doing, and follow Jesus from that point on. Even if you only have a few days or hours to live, God will take you just as you are.

Fear….how can we overcome it?


Many people today have fears of all kinds. Some are afraid of flying, some are afraid of enclosed spaces, some are afraid of bugs or snakes or anything which crawls on the ground. These are natural fears, the kind that we learn while growing up and some are just fears which are genetic. Now, that is not to say that there is anything wrong with fear. A little fear can keep you from getting killed in certain situations, fear can give you a bit more speed at times when you really need it (Feet, don’t fail me now!!) 🙂

The point that I came here to make is that fear of things that we, as humans, can’t do anything about is not healthy. Fear of dying for example. Death and dying come to every person on this planet and there are none who can escape it…it is a fact and inevitable so get over it. The manner in which you die is what many people actually fear, such as drowning or having an automobile accident. Nobody wants to experience either of those because we fear the  pain which will likely come as a result.

In the book of Judges, Gideon is getting ready to fight with thirty thousand men and God tells him that he has too many men, let those who are fearful go home, and he lost twenty-two thousand men right off the bat! There was a lot of fear in that group don’ t you think? God’s reason for thinning out the number was not to get rid of those who were afraid, but to show His glory and His ability to fight for Israel. Gideon did not need that many men to fight the Amalekites, and even after the first bunch left he still had over ten thousand and God told him that there were still too many.

God knew that with such a large force, Israel would think that it was their power that had defeated their enemies and He wanted to show them that He would fight for them if they would let Him. To continue the story, God tells Gideon to watch them as they drink from the stream. Those who lapped the water like a dog would be the ones that he would use as his army, so Gideon was left with only three hundred out of ten thousand.

Why am I telling you this story from the Bible? Simply to point out that God can overcome any obstacle, no matter how big it seems to us but only if we let Him do it. He won’t take over your life, you still have a choice to make every day. If you ask Him to come into your day and help you with your everyday problems, He will, but He won’t fix them for you. You have to learn to listen to Him and then use what He has told you to fix them yourself. It is the obedience that we have always had a problem with. Adam couldn’t do it and many others in the course of time had problems with obeying the words and the prophecies given by God and we do too.

You can call it “being stubborn or hard-headed” if you wish, but the point is that humanity is that way and Satan uses it against us. We think that we are doing it, that it is our idea or our solution when the solution has come from Satan if it goes against God’s will for your life. “But, how can I know what God’s will is for my life?” you may ask. The answer to this is easy and hard too. You have to sit down and read a book….the Bible, God’s Word and wisdom for us. Pray about His will for you while you read it and you will find it, He will reveal it to you, but you have to put some effort into it. Reading a few verses here and some over there won’t help and in fact will confuse you even more. Begin at the beginning and read through, then pray about it and read it again. The fear of God will leave and the love of God will show up in your life and in your heart. Learn about Him because He already knows everything about you!

What have you done lately?


Well…lets see, I washed the dishes and the clothes. Then my son and I took the garbage out and got the mail. Yes, this is how my day has gone today, so far. What have you done? Are you a child of God? Do you know Jesus?

As you can tell, I was called a few years ago to be a minister, not just a pastor of a small church but one out here where everyone can see and read what I say. The words which I put out here are not my own exactly, they come from the Holy Spirit because I can’t take the credit for all of the things which I have put here. I can’t help but inject Jesus into my posts. This is not an “online diary”!!! I would never put my own personal life out here so that everyone can read it and learn about me!

I am not important nor am I the person that needs to be learned about, but Jesus wants to know you and He wants you to learn about Him and ask Him to come into your life! You know, there are many people who have never heard about Jesus, even in America, let alone the entire world! It has been two thousand years since Jesus ascended back to His home with the Father, and even though the church was told to go out and tell others about Him and the salvation that God offers through Him, there are many who either haven’t heard the message or don’t understand it.

We are the “body of Christ” on Earth but if we don’t put feet to our faith and go to those who need Him, they might never know about Him and the grace that has been granted to us! If you don’t know Jesus, then it isn’t your fault at all. It is just that you are not part of the solution, yet! Have you had trouble in your life since you heard of Jesus? If you have heard only one sermon or maybe one family member told you about Jesus, yet you said that you weren’t ready yet, or maybe you think that you aren’t good enough to come to Jesus, then today…right now is the time to ask Him to come and clean up your life and your heart so that you can belong to Him!

I know that some people have said that, “Jesus wouldn’t want me. You don’t know what I have done.”, well maybe I don’t know what you have done in your life. The number of sins that you have committed and the people who you may have hurt is none of my business, but Jesus knows! If He is dealing with you and your heart, you will know and if you can feel that then Jesus has decided that you are needed in His Kingdom. You can do something for the Kingdom of God that no other person on Earth can do, but you can!

God knows exactly what you can do and how much, so He will put you where you can and will be the most useful to Him. Yes, it sounds like you are a servant to Him and we are to an extent, but our relationship means more to God than just our service. He wants this relationship to be a two-way relationship like He had with Adam and Eve in the Garden before they disobeyed Him. Can you do this on your own? Absolutely NOT! We cannot do or be the servant that God wants or needs us to be on our own strength and there is nothing that we can do that will “help” God save us and get us into Heaven!

Jesus did everything that was necessary for us to have salvation and enjoy the grace of God in our lives and there is nothing that we can add to it that will make it better. You can’t improve on the perfection that God provided through Jesus, all that we have to do to claim our salvation is to believe in Him and what He did for us. Belief through faith in Jesus is all that is necessary, once that is accomplished then you are free from sin’s hold on your life and you are able to be the person that God intended for you to be!

Who is this Man?


 “Nobody knows the exact date of His birth, and yet His birth has divided all of history to A.D. and B.C. He never, so far as we know, wrote a book, and yet more books have been written about Him than any other person. He never painted a picture or composed any poetry or music that we know of, and yet He has been the inspiration of the greatest music, art, and poetry that the world has ever known. He never had any formal education, yet more schools, colleges, universities, and seminaries have been founded in His name than any other person who ever lived.” – part of a devotional that I received from Love Worth Finding Ministries

Of course the man in the reference above is Jesus the Christ, our Messiah, the Son of the Living God. His influence on the world is undeniable, whether you believe in Him as the Messiah or not, and the effect that Christianity has had in the past two thousand years is polarizing. So, what is it about Him that makes people either love or hate Him and His followers? There is not middle ground concerning Christianity either, it is black and white.

He said it Himself, “And if the world hates you, know that it hated me before you.” John 15:18; so why does the world truly hate Christianity and Jesus in particular? Because of many things which don’t have much to do with the religion, such as His race and because His blood had to be given in order for us to be justified and sanctified by belief in what He did for us. Those are the two main points that I have noticed about those who are against believing in Him. What has that got to do with anything?

Just because He was born into the Jewish culture and God required a blood sacrifice to atone for sin? Big deal! The sins of Adam and Eve were covered by the blood of an animal that had to be killed in order for them to have clothing and from that point on the blood of an animal was required as the sacrifice of atonement for sin. The only difference is that on the cross, the perfect Son of God is the One Who gave His life as a ransom for all, not just a few but all! That is the part which the world wants to reject. Nobody wants a gift that cost that much to be given to them for free, everyone wants to earn it, but there is nothing that you or I can do to earn and be worthy of His sacrifice! Everything was done on the cross that needed to be done and we can’t add to it!

No amount of work on your part or mine will aid in any way your entrance into heaven. Accepting Jesus as your Savior and Lord and believing in what He did for you and for everyone else is all that is necessary. Though, you will be led to do more after you are saved by His grace it will not add anything to your entrance into Heaven except that you may bring a few people with you. Please, pray about the scriptures that point to Him in the Old Testament while you read them, then look up the references in the New Testament that show the fulfillment of the Old. Once you realize that He was there from the beginning as the Son, until He came as the Son of Man and He will come as the King of Kings, you will know your Savior is Jesus the Christ as the Son of the Living God!

 

 

Cults, idols, and people


What can you say to people who won’t listen? Nothing and even if you do say or discuss your belief with them, it is like talking to a dog or a cat. They hear what you say, but it means nothing to them because they choose not to really listen. It is the same with cults and their beliefs. They think that they are right and everyone else is wrong. No matter the proof that you give them, until God changes them and opens their eyes spiritually nothing that you say or show to them will make any difference.

I have been burdened by the Spirit to attempt to bring the Truth of God’s Word and His Son, Jesus, to those who are caught up in a belief which isn’t much over a century old. Yet, the followers of this “religion” claim to be the only inhabitants who will be in Paradise. They also refuse to look at or believe any other book (Bible) other than their own. I am talking about the Witnesses or Jehovah’s Witnesses. Now, I don’t claim to have the knowledge of God, just the facts as stated in their history so here is a sample of it:

The Jehovah’s Witnesses was begun by Charles Taze Russell in 1872. He was born on February 16, 1852, the son of Joseph L. and Anna Eliza Russell. He had great difficulty in dealing with the doctrine of eternal hell fire, and in his studies came to deny not only eternal punishment but also the Trinity, the deity of Christ, and the Holy Spirit. When Russell was 18, he organized a Bible class in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 1879 he sought to popularize his aberrant ideas on doctrine. He co-published The Herald of the Morning magazine with its founder, N. H. Barbour; and by 1884 Russell controlled the publication and renamed it The Watchtower Announcing Jehovah’s Kingdom and founded Zion’s Watch Tower Tract Society (now known as the Watch Tower Bible and Tract Society). The first edition of The Watchtower magazine was only 6,000 copies each month. Today the Witnesses’ publishing complex in Brooklyn, New York, churns out 100,000 books and 800,000 copies of its two magazines–daily!

Russell claimed that the Bible could be only understood according to his interpretations–a dangerous arrangement since he controlled what was written in the Watchtower magazine. This kind of assertion is typical among leaders of cult religions.

I have had many friends over the years who are Witnesses, but we never tried to convert each other. Now that I am a pastor, I need to get the word out to those who may be caught up in this deceitful practice. I know that there are many who are genuinely righteous about their religions and many of them are good people, but we can all be deceived at some point, especially when the deception is convincing.

The times ahead of us will see many who will be led astray, even as the Word says “to fool even the elect of God” but we must adhere to the Truth of the Word and not someone’s opinion of it. The NWT was born out of a man’s mind and because that man and religion didn’t want to accept the punishment outlined in the scriptures as well as the God-head including the Holy Spirit, the Son and God Himself.

I am not going to expound upon the evil of man or the cult behaviour of certain religions in our world, but the point is that Christ is the only way to salvation! Works look good, but the entirety of the Old Testament was God’s way of proving to the nation of Israel that man’s works and mankind’s religious expression was useless without faith in God and also in Jesus. Disbelieving Jesus’ deity and putting Him in the same category as an angel will get you nowhere near Heaven’s gates except in judgement.

How you believe is important but the most important part of that belief is Who you place your faith in and it must be Jesus Christ, the Son of God. He is the only way to eternal life, He is the Door and the Good Shepherd and He should be the One leading you daily. Not your meeting place, not your church leaders or your work for the church! Nothing that we do here will last except that which we do for Him and through Him for the Kingdom of God and not the kingdom hall.

A Christian is not somebody who simply believes that Christ died for his sins. The devil believes that. A Christian has repented of his sins and has invited Christ into his heart to be his Savior and Lord. You can intellectually believe that an air-plane can fly, but in order for you to fly you must try out its wings by getting on the plane. In the same way, when you give your heart to Jesus Christ, He takes control of your life and begins to make you into the person He wants you to be, yet you also have to give Him that control every day. That is what Jesus meant when He said “take up your cross daily and follow me”. Your life doesn’t have to be absolutely perfect for you to go to heaven but you do have to be “under the blood” of Jesus and be clothed in His righteousness.

At the moment you trust Christ as your personal Savior, you are eternally saved, eternally secure, and God begins to work on you and in your life daily giving you the words needed and the ability to get through that day’s temptations and be an example to others as they see your life and His through your actions. Ask God to show you these truths and pray about the salvation that only comes through Jesus.

The differences between traditional Protestant Christianity and Jehovah’s Witnesses are trivial. Yes, there are doctrinal differences but there are those between Baptist and Methodist and Episcopalian churches, so what is our problem with the Witnesses? Their dedication to God? Their willingness to go out to tell others? Jealousy? Because of their faith in God, in YHWH? I think that that is the very thing that most people have against them, many Christians don’t have the faith and the confidence in their faith to go out to people’s houses and try to talk to them about the Bible and what it says! If the church, all denominations, would go out and do this just half of the year the whole of the nation would be experiencing a revival that would rival that which happened in the past two hundred years!!

All denominations are similar and they all have differences, but as long as we are following Jesus and giving our life and our heart to Him it doesn’t matter which name is on our church. Even Jesus told His disciple’s that those who were teaching about Jesus who were not of their group that “as long as they are with us, they are not against us” regardless of their position.

Think about it carefully because we are all going to be in Paradise one day.

Time off


It is something which we don’t take unless we really need it and that is why I have been absent for a while. I have been having to deal with an auto-immune disease for a while and with the prayers of many people and God’s grace, I will conquer this at some point. It may just go into remission, but if it stays that way for a while then I will be grateful. I have used my time to rest and be the pastor that I need to be and to find ways to cope with this in a natural way rather than taking all the chemicals that the pharmaceutical companies want our doctors to prescribe for us. I don’t need all of the so-called “side effects” that are likely to be worse than the disease itself!

Anyway, enough about my problems.

Time off…is it something that we do or is it necessary at all? It actually is both. We have to decide to really take time off from our vocation and get away for a while. Do people really do this? In today’s society with all of the cell phones and tablets and laptops, it really isn’t very likely that many people get completely out of touch. I can do it, somewhat, because I live in a rural area where there is little or no cell coverage and I have to get my Internet access through a satellite. Granted, I am not out of touch because I still use my cell phone to check in with my Facebook friends and some other friends that I send text messages to over the wifi in my home but that is just my life.

Real time off should be a complete getaway from technology, although I don’t know if that is really possible in our society today. But, twenty years ago we didn’t have such a pervasive invasion of our time and our lives. Cell phones were present but the networks that supported them were sparse and there were no smart phones and no Internet to speak of yet. We and our parents and grandparents lived just fine without all of the technology that we have today and we made it alright. What happened? This technology was supposed to give us twenty hour work weeks and a better quality of life. It seems that life is more complicated and hurried and harried because of the technology that is so prevalent today!

Where can we find a peaceful alternative to all of the technology and the intrusion that it has brought into our families and our lives every day, almost twenty-four hours of every day? Can we possibly find a way or a place that we can have real peace and joy in our lives? Actually, it is not a place or even something that we can do to have peace and joy…it is a person, the Person of Jesus Christ.

Giving your life and your all to Him because He gave His life and His all to redeem you from the penalty of sin is the way to a joyful life and one that can be filled with peace. Contrary to what many believe, the sin which He saved us from is living outside of obedience to God’s grace and the belief in Jesus’ sacrifice for each of us is what saves us. The acceptance of His sacrifice and the repentance that you experience because of it will give you the joy that you seek.

The drug dealers and killers, serial and otherwise, along with those who persecuted and killed hundreds in the past as well as today will pay for what they have done. So will those who have swindled money from unsuspecting victims in the stock and bond market, the war criminals which killed millions during wartime, whether it was during the second World War or during a country’s “modification” of its citizens to a “new way of living” will pay for what they did.

Hell was created to punish only one creature and his followers and that is Satan, but if you have not given your life to Jesus and truly become a follower of Him, then you are on the same side as all the legions of fallen angels who followed Lucifer and were cast out of Heaven with him. You will suffer the same fate in hell because of your rejection of Jesus and the Grace extended to all of us by God the Father. It doesn’t matter what sins you have or have not committed in your life, the unpardonable sin is the rejection of God’s favor and grace through Jesus and the acceptance of your pardon through Jesus’ sacrifice. If you will not accept it, believe it and repent to be a new creation in Christ then your punishment will be no different from Satan’s.

Your life, your joy can be complete through Jesus. But, if you reject Him, your destruction will be complete and eternal as well.

Can racism be fixed?


It is a topic on many people’s mind for some reason, especially in America, but why is it so important? What is bad about racism? Why do we still have it, even after more than forty years of “the dream”!? What can we do about getting rid of racism?

For starters, we could just program our children to not notice the color of people’s skin. It is done in schools all of the time, the “programming” of our kids. But what about the adults, the ones that have lived through the sixties and seventies ad nauseam, where will it end? Those of us who saw the riots in Los Angeles, the shootings in Chicago, etc. cannot just forget. Then there are the family stories of lynchings and the slavery that was endured by great-great grandparents. Yes, all of this must be taken into account but what can be done about the racism of today?

Can we fix it? It cannot be apologized away. There isn’t enough gold or silver or any amount of groveling which will pay the price to a people who were taken from their home land, sold into slavery by their own people or who were conquered and then sold. Nothing that can be said or done in reparation for over four hundred years of slavery and bigotry and hatred!

I am a Caucasian male, born in the same year as our President. Yes, I have seen the terror in people’s eyes, the fear and anger during the late sixties when I was just starting school at about the same time that Martin Luther King, Jr. was murdered and a few months later Bobby Kennedy was shot while campaigning! The thing is that none of my family, as far back as I can trace, has ever owned a slave. Yet, “crackers”, white people like me, are blamed for every slight, every injustice that has ever happened in the past one hundred years or more.

Why? Because of racism. Not our racism, but the racism that exists in our culture. I don’t blame African-Americans for this, it is not their fault. It is not my fault that racism exists in the South or in America as a whole. I believe that Satan himself has used racism to great effect in America and has used it to stir up so much hatred and enmity between people who don’t know each other, they just know that skin color and culture are different between us. God created mankind, He did not create certain races of people to do certain things and others to do other things in this world. God created one race that had many different shades of skin color because of the climate that they settled in, not because one is better or worse than any other!

God is the only person Who can bring about the end of racism and bigotry and when Jesus comes back and rules the world as King, it will happen! This is not an “if” or a “possible” outcome, it will happen because Jesus said so! At the end of the Tribulation, when the one-thousand year reign of Christ begins, there will be no more bigotry and racism and those who try to keep it going will answer to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords! God removed His people from slavery after four hundred and thirty years, He did not endorse it. Those who were in slavery in Israel were to be released on the seventh anniversary of their slavery, it was not to be a life-long servitude unless the slave loved the family enough to become a bond-servant and it was the slave’s choice not the masters.

We cannot do away with racism by our own choices. Humanity doesn’t have the moral and ethical capacity to get rid of it or any other bigoted ways of treating people, not on our own strength at least. The love of God through Jesus can open our eyes and our hearts so that we no longer act on our cultural and familial learned behavior toward others, but if it has been taught from an early age it is still there. Only the change wrought by Jesus in your life and mine can cause it to be any different, so the choice is clear…choose Christ as your Savior and follow Him. Serve Him as your Master and Lord because He is the only Master to whom service is due!

Why not Jesus?


Do you believe in Him? Does He offend you?

Is belief in Him too hard or offensive to you?

Why?

What is so offensive about Jesus? Is it because Christianity believes that He is the Son of God or because He died on the cross and rose from the grave alive to ascend to the Father?

He is the only Savior that we have, all of us, and yet few people claim to be true Christians. Many do claim to be Christians but they say they only attend church when they feel like it or they only go to church once or twice a month. How is that being a follower of Christ? Peter, James and John didn’t follow Him on Monday and Wednesday only and let the other disciples take over during the rest of the week! Being a “sometimes” Christian is like being a sometimes husband or wife, how long would that last? Not long at all!

The price that you are willing to pay for hope and strength in any situation, depending on the severity of the situation, is also dependent upon your desire to find hope and salvation in that situation. Your life, whether it is this one or the one for eternity, is precious to God whether you believe it or not. Nothing that God has done or will do is dependent upon you or your input or opinion, it is up to Him and what He desires for you and your life! Belief in that is good but it is not necessary because He will cause things to work in such a way that His will and purpose will be fulfilled.

Sometimes or part-time relationships don’t work or last for long, whether it is a friendship, a committed relationship or one that is supposed to be one that is for your own salvation! Part-time commitments just don’t last. The one who is doing things part-time is you! Jesus is all in, He has loved you since before the world began and it was His love for each of us that held Him to the cross, not those nails.

If you have ever felt a tug or a pull on your heart, inside while you were reading something inspirational or maybe at a service of some kind, that was the Holy Spirit knocking at the door to your heart. The only thing that you need to do is to invite Him in. You don’t have to clean up your act or get to be a better person, that will happen when He comes to live with you. He will clean up your heart and your mind and make you a new creation. Your belief in Jesus and asking Him into your life is all that is required on your part and as long as your change is real, you will never lose it.

If you just have a feeling, all fuzzy and warm inside, but no change in your life. No real relationship change between you and Jesus, then maybe you need to check again. Pray and talk to God, read the Word and ask Him to make Himself real to you. He will hear your prayer if you mean it, but He knows whether you do or not. You can’t fool Him and you can’t hide from Him either. Remember Jonah? He tried to run from God and His call too, and look where he ended up? Once you truly decide to let Jesus into your life, you are never alone again. It is your choice and yours alone which will decide your eternal destiny, but if God has called you and you have felt it please don’t ignore it because He has something great in store for you!

Can you reconcile Jesus’ limitations?


There are many who deny that Jesus was the Christ because He seems to be limited in His ability as the Son of Man. But, did you ever consider that He limited Himself because of His love for us? Think of this: the question has often been posed about whether God could create something which He could not move, but this question sets up a paradox which doesn’t exist. Since God created the whole universe, as expansive as it is, the answer to the question is “no, He would not”, not that He could not. There would be no point in creating something so large because He already has created something which we cannot comprehend, limitless time and space. We cannot see the edge of the universe because our limited instruments can’t penetrate any distance past which time allows and time is controlled by God Himself.

Jesus’ limitations while living as a man, were the same limitations that we have except when He asked the Father to glorify Himself for a reason, such as bringing Lazarus back after four days in the grave. He proved His control of the elements when He came to the disciples by walking on the water, man cannot do this without the aid of some trickery or manipulation of the video by computers. Yes, Jesus had limitations but they were limitations that allowed Him to be the Son of Man. He could’ve done far more, but if it did not serve the purpose for which He came then why bother?

Just as someone who has a fast car doesn’t exercise that speed every time they are on the highway, Jesus did not use His power as Creator unless it suited His purpose for being here, unless it actually punctuated Who He was and why He came! There is no need nor reason for using power when you have it unless it is needed for a reason, specifically to glorify God!

Yes, He could’ve forced Israel to see Him as Who He was, He could’ve made it abundantly clear but that would not have taken His message to the rest of us. He came to bring the good news of the Kingdom of God to all people and that wouldn’t have happened if He had done things the way that we might have done them! We think small in most areas, God thinks in terms of eternity, which we can’t even imagine.

Our lifespan is tiny in comparison to even one billion years and that is small compared to eternity! God sees all because He is outside the limitations of time. He sees your life from your physical birth all the way to the day you die and everything in between. Yet, the most important decision in your life has nothing to do with your job or your family or your finances, it involves your relationship with Jesus and the decision that you make about Him. Will you believe in Him and follow Him so that others can see His work in your life and want that in their lives? Or will you decide that you can do it on your own, without Him? Your way may be a life filled with helping others, giving of your time and energy so that others can have a better life, doing things for those who may not be able to do for themselves but if you are doing this without the love of Jesus in your life it will gain you praise from men but it will avail you nothing when you come to God and present your life to Him.

The question at that point is, “What did you do with Jesus?”

If your life was spent in your own strength and your own ability to do good things for people, then it may have gained you praise from them but your reward perished with you!

The lasting legacy of a life lived through Christ is that you will live into eternity and so will those who have benefited from His love that was expressed in your life toward them. Jesus lived His life in service to the Father’s will and also in service to those that He came to bring the message of life to. He did this without being arrogant, but by being a humble servant to all. Power flowed from Him into their lives and enriched them, it did not corrupt Him or those who learned the lessons that He taught. This is the legacy that we are to bring to our world and those around us while we are able to do so, this is the message of a life lived through Christ and His life lived through yours!

What do you want from me, Jesus?


I feel that there are many who may have asked this question over the years and decades and even through the centuries. The answer surprises many people because they think that Jesus wants more than we can give. For many, their beliefs of what He wants causes them to back away from Him because they cannot imagine themselves giving Him anything, even when they know that He is the only One that can meet their needs.

How can we get around our own beliefs and cultural bias toward serving Jesus? What can we do that will make us be useful to Him? Is there anything that we can do that will answer these questions or even, can the answers be found? There is a simple, for many people too simple, answer to these questions and it is …. No!

Yes, we can get around the cultural bias, but the answer to the other questions referring to “what can we do” is nothing. We can do nothing on our own to help Jesus. We cannot assist Him in our redemption and salvation because only He could do what needed to be done and He has. His death on the cross that day in 33 AD, accomplished everything that was necessary for every person on earth to be able to come to know Him and to have access to God.

His sacrifice, His life that He lived in total obedience to His Father without sin, was what was required so that the gulf between us and God could be spanned by Him. So that we would have access to God the Father and forgiveness through Jesus as long as we believe in what He did on the cross and in Who He is.

Belief and acceptance as well as being able to follow in His steps to bring the message of the Gospel to others through our life and our witness. We don’t have to go on mission trips, you just have to represent Him through your life, your character by allowing Him to shine through your life into the lives of others, this is what Jesus wants from us. Obedience to the command that He gave to His disciples to take the gospel to everyone who will hear.

Obedience is our job in God’s kingdom. Faith and belief in Jesus and the work that He accomplished on the cross is our requirement, our part that we need to do because it is the only thing that we can do ourselves. He has already accomplished everything that was necessary for our salvation by His death, burial and resurrection because He was the only One that could do what needed to be done.

Mankind is not able to redeem himself in the eyes of a Holy and righteous God and Creator. We are His creation, the only ones who enjoy the ability to commune with God and have fellowship with Him. The angels worship Him but they don’t have the privileges which God gave to us and they long to know of it. No matter how many amino acids that are found in ice or how many theories that are put forth trying to explain our existence as some cosmic accident, there is no scientific proof of it at all. God is the only one who created this universe and each one of us!

We are the work of His hands and everything else was spoken into existence because He wanted it that way. The perfection and specific way that everything works and moves is by His design, not some accident. God loves you, each of you, and there is no denial of that if you are able to read this. Even our eyes are marvels to science because they can find no evolutionary trigger that would cause an animal to “evolve” cells which do what our eyes can do. God did it and that settles it!