Tag: Jesus

What else is new?


Many times we see things, maybe for the first time, and we think that it is so beautiful. But, a sunset or sunrise isn’t a new thing and neither is a beautiful butterfly that we have never seen before. All of these things have happened and have been seen by many other people in years past, so what makes them so beautiful and new to us? It is because to our eyes and our perception, it is new and it is just as beautiful as a newborn baby. Why is a newborn baby so special? Because each of us is unique and special. We all see things differently and with a perception that nobody else sees. That is why we all see art differently, regardless of the type of art it might be. To your eyes, a painting by some unknown artist may not be so beautiful and special, but to someone else’s eyes that painting might just point to a newly discovered talent which will one day grace the halls of a museum.

Just because you have seen something like a painting or a sculpture or even a sunset before and to you it is just okay, to someone else it may be the most fantastic sight in the world! Think of it this way: if you were born blind without the possibility of ever being able to see a painting or a sunset, then one day you woke up and were able to see for the first time in your life. Everything and everyone that you saw that day would be the most beautiful person or vision that you had, until then, ever seen!

To each of us is given a certain amount of time and talent that we have to use to try to make the world a little better place after we have been here than it was before. Your use of that talent or talents is the gift that God has given to you along with the ability to use it. What you do with it from this time forward is up to you. What will you make that is new and beautiful and fresh for someone else to see and feel? Would you if you had the chance? Don’t use your talent for just yourself, make sure that you do it for others and their enjoyment as well because when you are gone, how will people remember you if you didn’t?

God’s grace


God’s grace is sufficient for all of our needs. Why does He extend His grace to us? Because we don’t deserve it, but He gives it to us anyway, that’s why. God loves us and wants the best for all of us, whether you believe this or not doesn’t change the fact. His love is deeper and more pure than anything that we can understand and yet we push Him away more and more. Many people today seem to want less and less to do with Christianity in general. What have we ever done to deserve this? Have we attacked your schools or your homes? No, we do want the best for all and that is why we try to tell you about our Savior. It is that “telling” that everyone who has a phobia against Christians is afraid of or is totally against.

There are numerous instances where the church is vandalized or even set fire, especially in Europe, but it seems to be happening more and more. The sentiment toward the church was predicted by Jesus for the time that we are living in, so it is not totally unexpected but it still brings out pain in my heart and it hurts our world, not as an entity but as God sees us.

God extended His love and His grace to us through Jesus and His sacrifice for our sins. Whether you want to believe in Him or that grace which is so richly poured out on us is totally up to you. It is your decision to choose which part of the world that you will live in, the Christian part or Satan’s part, because there is no middle ground! You are either on one side or the other.

I know that some have said that they will sit on the fence until something or someone knocks them to one side or the other. The problem with this thinking is that, you may fall off when you die and if you haven’t made the decision to follow Jesus by that time then you will be on Satan’s side of the fence. Paint the church black on one side and white on the other to represent God and Satan, allow them to meet in the middle and see how well you can walk the line without dipping into one or the other. You must choose!

The problem that we have is that it is the choice and the power that we have to choose one or the other that causes so many to wait or to put it off for too long. God is patient, but your life goes on regardless and it is limited. As the writer of James said, “your life is like mist or a puff of smoke”, especially compared to eternity and while you have it you must make the best choice that you can. This can’t be denied because even comparing our lives to the past millennia or two, we are only here for a very short time! The choices that you make during this life do have an effect on where you spend eternity! Choose Jesus and come to Him, before it is too late. We live so close to death that many people don’t notice it anymore. People get killed on the highway every day. They are shot and killed for no reason at all in our cities and towns and we hear about it every day, but we get used to it. Life is precious but it is short, make the choice which will give you life everlasting. Ask Jesus to come into your heart and save you from your sins and from the life that you would’ve lived.

Do it…before it is too late.

Reasoning


We make excuses for every decision that we make. Why? There are many who look to themselves for power and the way to have wealth and prosperity. Even if you are able to make lots of money and have all of the toys that “rich folks” have, what are you going to do with it when something happens to your child’s health or your spouse’s health? Having a Jag in the garage with twenty-six inch wheels won’t help you when you are diagnosed with cancer. Having a huge home won’t help when the economy crashes and the electric grid fails because of no bills being paid. Having a walk in refrigerator with enough food to feed a small village won’t do you much good when the electricity is cut off.

Justifying your excesses in life or your excuse for not going to church is the most silly and stupid way to take a trip to hell that there is. Even Satan himself knows Who God is and the atheists and Muslims don’t believe that he exists either, but one day they will meet him and the demons who followed him.

Stuff and nonsense will not be of any good at all to your eternity. The only One that can possibly change you and your life is Jesus Christ! Learn of Him through the Bible and a Bible teaching church, not some place where they tell you that you can pray anything in His name and He will give it to you! God is not a genie, He is the Creator of all that is and He is jealous of our love and devotion. He wants us to come to know Him and to choose to love Him, but it is your choice and nobody else’s decision. God doesn’t even force the angels in Heaven to worship Him, it is their choice.

It was their choice when one-third of them chose to follow Lucifer in rebellion against God, which got them all thrown down to Earth. We have been deceived by their lies since Eve decided to try some fruit from a tree which God had told Adam NOT to eat of. She justified her actions by blaming it on the snake and we have been doing the “blame game” in one way or another ever since. Justification is something which we have in our fallen state that we use to get out of punishment or to make us feel better about the lie that we told. It is just another way that our pride is able to deceive us into thinking that we know better than God how to run our lives so we can feel better about what we do, even when we know it is wrong.

All sorts of behavior has been justified in the name of Jesus and Muhammad and other religions for hundreds of years. It make the religions of the world and religion in general look bad because of what has been done, being justified by beliefs that others did not share. Which then makes those religions look terrible and hypocritical in the news and to the world in general. This is one of the reasons which has caused so many to walk away from and choose not to follow or believe in any religion.

Choosing to walk away doesn’t help and won’t fix anything. By doing this you are agreeing with Satan that God has no place in your life and that you have no place or reason to follow Him. It is your right and privilege to believe this way if you wish, but how will you feel when Jesus does come back one day? When you see Him and know that what you had heard about during your life was true, but you chose not to believe it, then it will be too late. Your decision for your life and for your eternity has been made.

Please, give Jesus a chance to prove His promises in this life so that you will have an eternity after this life is done. True, we all have an eternity to step into after this life is over but the difference is the life that your eternity will bring because of the choices we each make now. Your life and the decisions made in it are tiny compared with eternal life which you have before you when this one is over so choose wisely.

What are you looking for?


Many people today are searching for something in life to give them hope and joy, but many don’t find it. Why is that? Mainly, it is because they are looking in the wrong places and trying the wrong things.

People tend to give all sorts of stuff a try to see if it fits or if it might fill the need in their lives, hoping that one of them might fill the spot which seems to always feel empty and hollow. Is this because they are ignorant or maybe it is because they haven’t found the right combination yet? No, there is no specific combination or specific thing or drug which will fill this void in your life. But, there is a person Who can do all of those things and more and His name is Jesus.

Living without Him is possible but it is unfulfilling. Yes, you can get through life without Him in it, but you will always feel lost and alone regardless of what you try or who you may be with. When you have felt a tug from the Holy Spirit, whether it is by a dream or a church service or someone witnessing to you, that is Him calling to you. You can walk away and ignore Him, but the call will be felt again. It won’t go away. When that call comes to you, it will come whether you want it or not, because there is something that God knows about you that you do not. That something is a particular thing which only you can do. It may be a message that you can bring to someone or it might be that you will be able to touch someone’s life in a way that nobody else can. But, only you can do it and God knows this which is why He is calling you.

Yes, there is something that you can do or someone who you and only you can speak to or bring the Light into their life and until you let that Light into your life they might never see it. Jesus is the Light and the Life and the proof of it is in God’s Word. All that you need to do is seek Him out because until you do, that part of you which feels empty will never be filled with the One and only Person that can and will make you feel like a whole person.

Think about it and allow Him to come into your life and give you His Life.

What should we do?


I read a report today about some research that the Barna group did and here is a small excerpt from that report: The California-based Barna Group reports that the combined number of unchurched people in America, approximately 156 million, would make the eighth most populous country in the world.

What can we do about these people who don’t want to go to church? Can we, as Christians, reach them in ways which might make a difference? I don’t know.

I have heard from some who say that we are all hypocrites and that they don’t want to go to a church service with people who claim one thing and live another. Then, change your own life! Be the Christians that God intends for you to be! If you truly are and you have given your heart to Christ and asked Him to come into your life and change you, then show it! Let people outside the church see Him and not a fictitious version, a fake Jesus, through your life and your actions.

Why do I say this? Because, if they won’t come to church then you may be the only Jesus that some people ever meet! And, if you aren’t being Jesus outside the church walls, then what good are you doing? What is your fruit that Jesus said that you would produce if you really are His disciple and an adopted child of God?

Are you going to fulfill the role of being the “hands and feet” of the church and of Jesus? This is what we are supposed to be doing if we truly belong to Him after all. I know that many of us can’t provide much in the way of monetary help to people in need because many of us are also in need too. Just being a worker for Jesus, showing your Christian character when you are at work or in a public place, essentially practicing your Christianity. That is what we are called to do and to be!

The best part about practicing your faith is that it will be easier for you and it will help you to learn more about being like Christ if you act like Him every day. Just as practice makes you better at sports or music, it also helps with your walk with Christ and since you are doing it every day it will become more genuine to those who don’t go to church with you. Therefore, they will see how you are enjoying life with Christ and they might want that joy with Him too.

You know, it seems that many people think that being a Christian or becoming a Christian will restrict your joy in life or even take the enjoyment out of life and that is not true at all! I have more joy in my life because I am a Christian, not because I pastor a church but because I have a future to look forward to. Not just in my life here but also in the life that I will have in Heaven or on the renewed Earth one day! The best part to look forward to is that time and the measure of it won’t matter anymore!

We will have all of eternity to learn from Abel and Adam and Noah and Abraham. We can know the wisdom of Solomon and of all the people in the scientific past such as Isaac Newton and Leonardo Da Vinci (they weren’t agnostic you know).

How can we make it better?


Many people today don’t seem to want to make anything better, have you noticed that? It seems that everyone wants things given to them but nobody wants to make life better and give back. What a waste. I know that the world in general is getting worse because that is all that you hear on the news and on radio and television these days, even though I would question the truthfulness of the reporting from both of those outlets sometimes.

Does anybody even care about each other any more? It seems that we are more worried about being politically correct and being non-offensive to everyone, except Christians of course. We also can’t bring ourselves to put any part of natural habitat in danger or even a fish or a bird, and yet people are being killed by the hundreds every day!

The thing is, people are trying to ban guns but the places where they are banned is usually where the most violence WITH guns is! Huh??

Giving back to your community is what we were commanded to do, yet when that is brought up people tend to laugh about it as if it is a joke. What has happened to our world and the society that we should be developing? It seems that we are more barbaric now than we were hundreds of years ago. We couldn’t do as much damage back then because our weapons were more limited than they are today, so maybe that is why it is so bad now.

In many ways, there really is no way for us to make this world a better place to live and work and go to school, because no matter how hard we try our efforts aren’t good enough. Why is that? Because we are living in the closing years of the age, that is why. Oh, yes there are people who don’t believe this because the Bible has been saying that we are living in the “end times” for hundreds of years. Why should today be any different or even ten years from now?

Because, if you really take a close look at the prophecies in God’s Word, you will notice that all of the players from Asia to the Middle East are coming into play just as God’s Word said that they would. It doesn’t matter if you don’t believe it or if you don’t want to believe it, it is happening. Like it or not, we are coming to the end of the road in a way that is going to get the attention of the world in a very immediate way, one which can’t be denied or explained with “natural phenomena” as its cause.

The only real way to make things better is to commit to give your life and your heart to Jesus because He is the Hope of the World! No person or “savior” or man can make this world any better, only Jesus can bring peace to your soul and to the world. There is nothing else which will fill that void in your life and no drug or amount of money can fill the empty feelings that you feel at the end of the day. Jesus is the One which is able to fill your empty life and make you whole for the first time and forever! Giving your life to Him is the only way to make your life feel the way that it was meant to feel.

1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God. 3 All things were made through Him, and without Him nothing was made that was made. 4 In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. 5 And the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend[a] it. (John 1:1-5)

These words testify to the fact of Who Jesus really was and Who He is today. He did not die on that cross permanently, He rose again on the third day just as He told His disciples that He would. The world and those in it don’t want Christianity to be true, they never have, but God intends for the world to hear the message of Jesus whether the world wants to or not and it will.

Jesus is the answer for the world’s problems and for yours too. No, He may not fix things immediately, but He will be with you in the storm and through the storm and give you strength enough to get through it! Seek Him out, learn about Him from the Word of God, pray that He would show you the things that will help you to know the Truth and He will do that and so much more.

Post traumatic stress disorder, where do we go from here


There are few things that many of us will ever accomplish in life, especially the things that many of our military servicemen and women do every day. But, there are also the trials of being in the service. Trials which only those who have been there can know. The only trials which some of us may know a little about are the kind which come during times of stress and pain and danger to us or to others around us. It is true that those of us who have never been in war-time situations will never really understand them, and truly that is a good thing in some respects.

In our country, America, we are privileged to have armed men and women who, in some instances, consider it an honor to serve their country so that we don’t know armed conflict in our streets the way it is elsewhere. I served in a branch of the service years ago, in the Air Force, but being an only child I didn’t go to war or to serve in far away places. My mother became disabled and I got out of the service because I was needed more at home.

The men and women who come back from service today come home with injuries which are evident to some but then some injuries are not so evident. Yes, there are many who come home with limbs missing, some with TBI (traumatic brain injury), many come home with moderate to severe PTSD. It is this ailment which is the type which many of us civilians can relate to. Some who are in relationships which are abusive know of this condition, some who are in police service or fire service know about it too, yet their struggles are also un-heard or disregarded just as the veterans who have served and come home still feeling the effects of trials and trouble and pain.

I will admit that I have only suffered from PTSD while being a fire-fighter/EMT during my time of service in that occupation, but even though it has been twenty years or so since that time I still feel its effects sometimes. With God’s strength and His help I have been able to overcome many of its demons, but there are many who are not that fortunate. Many of our servicemen and women are plagued by it all of the time, many women are haunted by it due to an abusive relationship that they either can’t get away from or maybe are afraid to get away from. Police and firemen/women are haunted by things which they have seen during their duty tours. The biggest problem that the public has with this is that PTSD is un-seen from the outside. It is a mental disorder and one that many people, myself included, don’t want to bring to light or are ashamed to do so because of the stigma which mental disorders seem to have in our society.

We are fine, in a way, when seeing a veteran come home with a missing limb or some deformity which is visible to the outside world, but when the issue is inside everyone seems to treat you as if you are crazy! You have lost it. You should be locked up to protect society from your rantings and possible outbursts which might kill someone. This is what our society has become over time. We look at war as we see it depicted by Hollywood, but we don’t believe what we are seeing or that it could somehow break down someone’s mental fortitude. The problem is that there are things which we don’t know about in wartime or in peace, on the streets and in homes which are so violent and cruel that our minds never were designed to process those kinds of feelings and the pain that comes with them, the fear that is there but we can’t or won’t show it.

God did not create mankind with the mindset to be hateful and cruel. This came to us as a result of Satan’s influence and the fall that was experienced a long time ago, which we are still feeling the effects of today. Many of our veterans are suffering from this brain injury, the kind which doesn’t go away with pills or treatment because it is part of your memory and unlike a computer our brains don’t have a delete key. We can’t just purge these sights and sounds and pains away. You just can’t do it, whether it was caused by abuse from a spouse or parent or in the middle of a fire-fight in the middle of Ramadi or in a gun fight on main street or even when you were on the scene of a murder or a fire in a small town or a big city. These things were not supposed to be this horrific, but it is part of our world today.

The only cure, the only person that can help is Jesus. The Word of God which became flesh and dwelt among men to know their pain and suffering so that He could understand more fully and be the Helper and the Physician to heal our hurts. Help me in the process of helping those who are in need of it. The homeless vet or battered wife or husband, the cop or fireman or woman who has seen much more violence and hate than they should. I don’t have the resources to do much, but prayer can go a long way toward helping more people than we realize. At least do that for all of them.

Differences…


There are so many divisions in our world today. Between people and countries and religions, and even those can be broken down into many categories which I really don’t want to address here. We divide our churches and our schools by popularity and wealth and we divide the towns and cities that we live in along those same lines as well. Then there are the racial and cultural divisions and a host of other problems which follow those lines. What is the reason for all of the divisive feelings and issues which crops up along all of these lines? Who or what started it?

The answer can be found in Genesis. Satan came along and divided the first couple from their idea of Who God is and what their portion should be in the world. Once that was done, it broke the relationship between Creator and creation and from that point on there has been a dividing line in every area of life on Earth. Why?

The reason for the divisions between religions and people and all of the other areas in life is specifically to keep us from unity. Unity of mind and purpose as well as between cultures, but especially keeping us from being united in our fellowship of believers and in worship of God. Think about all of the denominations which were created simply because one group in a church didn’t agree on the way to worship or how.

Divisions between cultures and individuals caused many problems for Jesus and His disciples as well as the problems which we see today. The message that He was teaching was not popular and today, He would be put out of the church because of the hard teaching which He said in His day. What happens when these things happen to your family, whether it is your family or the church family that you belong to?

The dividing lines are sometimes easy to see and sometimes they are invisible, until you see it happening in your life and in your church. Why do we allow these divisions to happen when we are supposed to be united in Christ? The reason? Because we are human and we don’t consider the One that we serve or should serve! Our lives are taken up in minutes and seconds every day and we let little things creep in and steal what little time that we have to give to each other and to God.

Today, I went to see a movie about an American hero, Chris Kyle, and I just finished reading his memoir too. He was an incredible human being, but most of all, he was genuine and totally committed to everything that he did. As his wife said in part of the book, “when he loved you, he jumped in with both feet”. That is how we are supposed to love each other and Jesus as well!

Think about it this way: God cares about us all and He jumped in with both arms and His feet when He went to the cross to redeem us! He didn’t consider it below Him to bring us into a true relationship with Him, that is just what Jesus did..He was all in when He loved us and showed it by going to the cross for us so that we could be redeemed by His blood.

There isn’t supposed to be any half-way Christians because being half-way doesn’t count. You either are or you’re not…you are either all in with both feet or you turn away and say “Let someone else do it, not me.”

Christians are not supposed to be trying to walk a thin line between being a sinner or a Christian and truthfully it can’t be done! It is simple…you either are or you’re not. Yes, I am repeating myself, but the point is important and it is so simple even a child can understand it. Consider your soul and your eternal home while you have time. Chris didn’t know that his time was up that day, and we don’t know when our time will be up either.

The love of God


These words from the song “The Love of God” truly touched me today, I hope that they will do the same for you as well.

The love of God is greater far, than tongue or pen can ever tell;
It goes beyond the highest star,
And reaches to the lowest hell,
The guilty pair, bowed down with care, God gave His Son to win;
His erring child He reconciled, and pardoned from his sin.
Oh, love of God, how rich and pure!
How measureless and strong!
It shall forevermore endure,
The saints’ and angels’ song…

Reading this today and sharing it with all who read here is the most wonderful feeling that I have had in a long time. It truly is hard to describe the joy that I have in my heart, with the hope that you will seek out the One who went so far to redeem us to Himself!

I pray that all of you who read this will seek Him out, learn about His love for you and give Him a chance to change your life forever. I will enjoy getting to know all of you in Heaven and in eternity. I don’t know how soon that will come, but I pray that we will meet each other soon. Until then, look up for your redemption draws nearer and nearer than He has been for a long, long time from our perspective at least.

The only way for us to truly get to know Him is to ask Him to come into our lives. When that happens, if we mean to truly follow Him, then our lives in many ways will never be the same. No matter what our circumstances may be prior to coming to know Jesus, our lives will be immeasurably changed afterward. Changed to being a totally new yet complete person in Christ, in character and in our everyday lives!

Live your life like a sermon


I got this in a very special email today. I hope that it touches your day like it did mine.

 

Some things to think about before it is too late. Real life stories that teach you many things in life. Excellent reading; These are based on true incidences both wonderful and inspirational.

1. Today, I interviewed my grandmother for part of a research paper I’m working on for my Psychology class. When I asked her to define success in her own words, she said, “Success is when you look back at your life and the memories make you smile.”

2. Today,I asked my mentor – a very successful business man in his 70’s – what his top 3 tips are for success. He smiled and said, “Read something no one else is reading, think something no one else is thinking,and do something no one else is doing.”

3. Today, after a 72 hour shift at the fire station, a woman ran up to me at the grocery store and gave me a hug. When I tensed up, she realized I didn’t recognize her. She let go with tears of joy in her eyes and the most sincere smile and said, “On 9-11-2001, you carried me out of the World Trade Center.”

4. Today, after I watched my dog get run over by a car, I sat on the side of the road holding him and crying. And just before he died, he licked the tears off my face.

5. Today at 7 AM, I woke up feeling ill, but decided I needed the money, so I went into work. At 3 PM I got laid off. On my drive home I got a flat tire. When I went into the trunk for the spare, it was flat too. A man in a BMW pulled over, gave me a ride,we chatted, and then he offered me a job. I start tomorrow.

6. Today, as my father, three brothers, and two sisters stood around my mother’s hospital bed, my mother uttered her last coherent words before she died. She simply said, “I feel so loved right now. We should have gotten together like this more often.”

7. Today,I kissed my dad on the forehead as he passed away in a small hospital bed. About 5 seconds after he passed, I realized it was the first time I had given him a kiss since I was a little boy.

8. Today,in the cutest voice, my 8-year-old daughter asked me to start recycling. I chuckled and asked, “Why?” She replied, “So you can help me save the planet.” I chuckled again and asked, “And why do you want to save the planet?”Because that’ s where I keep all my stuff,” she said.

9. Today,when I witnessed a 27-year-old breast cancer patient laughing hysterically at her 2-year-old daughter’s antics, I suddenly realized that I need to stop complaining about my life and start celebrating it again.

10. Today,a boy in a wheelchair saw me desperately struggling on crutches with my broken leg and offered to carry my backpack and books for me.He helped me all the way across campus to my class and as he was leaving he said, “I hope you feel better soon.”

11. Today, I was feeling down because the results of a biopsy came back malignant. When I got home, I opened an e-mail that said, “Thinking of you today. If you need me, I’m a phone call away ” It was from a high school friend I hadn’t seen in 10 years.

12. Today,I was travelling in Kenya and I met a refugee from Zimbabwe. He said he hadn’t eaten anything in over 3 days and looked extremely skinny and unhealthy. Then my friend offered him the rest of the sandwich he was eating. The first thing the man said was, “We can share it.”

The best sermons are lived, not preached!
Andy Reese, Retired,USA