Tag: Salvation

Preoccupied with what exactly?


It seems that in our daily lives, regardless of our religious faith or lack thereof, we are preoccupied with all sorts of things. Some of it is relevant to our lives, some of it is not but most of it seems to be of very little value in the scheme of our lives and those around us. We, and I say this openly, worry more about our twitter feeds and our Facebook friends than we do the homeless man who sleeps under a piece of cardboard to stay warm. We chase after our phones far more than we seem to chase after our spouses or our children. We worry more about our status on social media pages that we “belong to” more than we worry about our relationship with Jesus Christ! Technology has become an addiction for many people. From games and game systems to phones and tablets which many of us didn’t even have fifteen years ago because they weren’t available or were too expensive at the time.

Now, they are so cheap that Amazon is selling a five pack of Kindle Fire tablets for 250 dollars! Everyone in your family can have one so that nobody will pay any attention to each other when we all have our heads buried in our tablets! Most will be used for games, although as the saying went thirty years ago for Playboy “I just read the articles (books).” The problem with all of this preoccupation with games and electronic books and distractions is that we aren’t paying any attention to EACH OTHER!! And we aren’t paying any attention to God or His message because in many churches, they are using tablets and apps to spread the message as well! It is good that the message is getting out to more people this way, but many will just ignore the alerts from the church app just like they do any other alert.

We need to be talking TO each other more, not AT each other which is what happens when technology gets in the way. What can be done about this? Unfortunately, not much. The generation which came along around the turn of the 21st century called the “digital”generation has never lived without technology of some kind and they have always had access to the Internet. If something like an Electromagnetic pulse bomb or a nuclear explosion were to happen and cut off our technology for weeks or months or more, many people would go through such a withdrawal that it would be like a nation of drug addicts all going cold-turkey at once!

I know this sounds like a rant against technology, and I am using technology to write this but I do have a point to make. That point is this: we need to get our collective selves BACK into God’s Word, the Bible! A digital version will be better than no Bible at all, but a written one would be better because it wouldn’t need to be charged up to read and it wouldn’t be affected by a nuclear electromagnetic pulse which might send us back at least one hundred years technologically speaking. Our world and every person in it needs to get to know God, not Allah or any other pretender! The God of the Bible and specifically His Son, Jesus, because without Him you are doomed to an eternity of being out of the presence of God which will be hell.

God loves each person who reads this and He does care about every little thing in your life, but He doesn’t like the lifestyles that some of us live every day. If you have not given your heart and life to Him, then ask Him to help you with the decision…He will. Remember John 3:16,17: For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. 17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.

End or beginning?


Humanity tends to look at life as that time which we have here on Earth and that it mostly ends when your life ends. Some believe in reincarnation, some believe that when you die that’s it and there is nothing more…but for a Christian this is just a rehearsal for our eternal life, the life that we will have with Jesus. The one that never ends and that we will be with Him and our Christian brothers and sisters forever. Does life end with your last breath? This physical life on Earth does, but if your heart belongs to Jesus then your spirit goes on to everlasting life in God’s home, Heaven.

I can’t tell you anything about that wonderful place beyond death, except the things which I have read or the descriptions found in the Bible. Even those descriptions pale because human sight and comprehension just aren’t enough to tell others about that which lies beyond this life. It would be like trying to describe a color, any color, to a blind person who has never seen or experienced seeing a color such as a purple sunset or a clear blue sky. Words just don’t describe and can’t describe that which your eye sees! Like the boy who was in the movie “Heaven is for real!”, when he tried to describe someone or something that he saw it was just more…more real, more colors, more than he could describe with words.

Heaven is more than our imaginations can imagine accurately at least because there are colors and textures and gold which is so pure that it is clear like glass. We don’t have a reference for anything like that in our minds. Eternity is more than we can believe or imagine, but we will be there IF we belong to Jesus! For the first weeks or months we will likely be discovering far more than we could’ve thought or imagined that our life in eternity might be like. After we realize that we have been there longer than we thought, time won’t mean anything anymore!

Seek Him out, learn about Him, give your life to Him and ask Him to come into yours because this time on Earth is just a training period for the real thing!image

Why do we push God away?


This is a question which I have wondered about for many years. I know that many who don’t want Him in their life do this. The problem is that many Christians seem to do it as well. Oh, they come to church and go through all of the motions of being a Christian but they usually leave God and their Bible even sitting on the pew when they go home. We wouldn’t even do that to our cell phone, why do we do it with God? He is far more important and able to help us in everyday life than a piece of plastic and circuits and glass ever can.

The world, our country and many people in it have been pushing God away for a very long time. That is no way to keep a relationship alive, especially with your Creator! You wouldn’t expect your wife and family to put up with that kind of treatment, so why should God? Because He loves you far beyond any measure of human love or compassion, that is why. He is patient and loving in ways that we just can’t understand because His ways are not our ways, they are incomprehensible to us.

We just can’t understand Him or His Word, so many of us just quit trying. If we would put as much effort into reading and understanding the Bible as we do working on our taxes or following the Super Bowl, our country and our world would be a very different place. Our lives would be much better as well because we would be following Jesus, and His path is always the best.

Seek Him in order to know Him, why? Because He loves you more than you can imagine!

Life…


GodisInterestedinYouDo you know the Author of Life? The Creator of Life? The Way to Life everlasting?

The Person Who is all of those and more is Jesus the Messiah. He came so that we might have Life, so that we could have forgiveness of our sins and enter into eternity with Him. There is no other name under heaven by which we CAN be saved.

Today, we see all sorts of bad things or atrocities in our world. Things which most of us have never seen or heard about. Most of them so horrific that we can’t imagine anyone living in the places where they are. But, it is happening. In some areas in America but mostly overseas in the Middle East and Africa.

Life is not respected or revered in any culture anymore, whether it is the life of a child in the womb or your life and mine on the street. It seems that nobody cares about each person’s life, except their own. They, each of us it seems, only care about what is in it for me. Selfishness is rampant, and this is dangerous. Why? Because when things get really bad, everyone will be only looking out for themselves and no one else but them and possibly their immediate family.

God loves all of us and He hasn’t forgotten anyone, but there are so many who have forgotten Him…just turned away from Him and His wisdom. Whether they actually ever knew Him or not, that is between them and God and no one else knows about their salvation or lack of it besides Him. Nobody is condemned to Hell unless they reject His offer of grace and forgiveness through Jesus Christ.

It is a sad fact that many people do just that and never really think about it much, until they really need Him, and by that time their lives may be nearly over or they die before then. With death, you forfeit your chance at redemption because your chances for that are while you live here and now. Unless you make that decision while you live, there is no second chance once you are standing in front of Him. Your life is your chance, don’t throw it away or ignore the offer.

In spite of the questions in the picture about God’s interest in you, He really is. He cares enough for us that He knows how many hairs are on your head and mine. If He cares enough to even know that detail, then the rest of your days and your life is included in His knowledge of you as well.

Prayer and faith


Praisethelord Yes, both are necessary for a Christian and for our world too. Why do I say this? Because there are so many people who don’t want to admit this or hear it. Prayer and praise go together with faith and all of it is needed today. Because life and living today is hard enough without having faith in a future with Jesus. Prayer and faith go hand in hand, but it seems that many people don’t believe in having faith in a God which they can’t see. You can’t touch or see any of the “gods” which are worshiped in the world today, many of them are actually dead and in their graves yet people still think that they are “gods”. If they were then they wouldn’t be dead!

Satan is a fallen archangel, a guardian seraphim and one that once lived on the “mount of God” but pride brought him down because he thought that he could be like God and take God’s place. No one can do that but he convinced enough of the angels to follow him until there were a third of the angels thrown down from Heaven. We don’t know how many this was, but considering how much our world is in such a mess today it was a LOT!

Today it seems that nobody wants to acknowledge God as the Creator, but He is and He is NOT dead! Seek Him out while there is still time to do so. Read John 3:16,17; Romans 8 too, because they tell you what and Who you should know and why.

You are special!


11226182_931043076949751_7809076474956911366_n God loves you and He created this world and each of us in it to be a blessing to Him and to each other. Do I believe this? Yes, I do. Why do I believe this? Because He says so in every book of the Bible. The entire Bible is God’s letter of love to us and an instruction book so that we know how to live in this life and prepare for the next life!

Some people, even professing Christians, don’t believe that the Bible is a document of infallible words and promises. I do believe it and I will tell you why. Because simply if there is an error or a man-made lie in any part of it, that invalidates all of it. Jesus said that “Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.” Matthew 24:35 If the words written by the disciples will not pass away then it is inspired by the Spirit of God and that inspiration proves that God cannot lie! If He did, then He isn’t God! Also, if the New Testament is valid and it validates the Old Testament because when Jesus came that was the only Scripture available. God’s Word is true, Jesus was the Living Word, so there is no part of Scripture from the first line in Genesis to the last line of Revelation which isn’t true, period.

we obey

He loved us, so He obeyed the Father and went to the cross to pay for humanity’s sins. It is just that simple! The Creator became a human so that He could live a sinless life to pay for our sins. Is that enough to make you think that maybe I should be grateful and ask His forgiveness for those things which I have done? Consider that God, the Son and the Holy Spirit all were present and with each other before they created the universe and it was brought into being by the Word of God until they decided to make mankind in their image. Then, God formed man from the mud or clay and breathed the breath of Life into him and he became a living person, with a soul and the Spirit of God in himself!

Each of us has this same privilege and honor because we were known by God before we were born! He knew each person on Earth before they became a person and He knew their personality and how their life would be. We are created in His image uniquely because no other person on Earth is exactly like you or me. Even twins or triplets are different, although they may look similar to each other. Give Jesus a chance to show you how your life is supposed to be and what you can do with His strength and with Him working in your life. It is far more than you could accomplish alone I can promise you that!

Racetrack living


There are days which seem to fly by as if we live on or in a car on a racetrack, yet we can’t seem to get past the observation that God sees your life and mine from the starting line to the finish line. We can’t see it because our life looks to us like the view from a car on a track. All that we can see is the view around us, memories behind us and a little of what lies ahead of us, and that last part is blurred to an extent.

Some people think or at least seem to, that God is just sitting up in Heaven looking down on His subjects like a King without a care about us or any part of our lives. Our experience of God is limited by what we find in the Bible and what we see and hear in our lives, which today is very limited by political correctness. Yes, God can see all of our lives from His vantage point but from His point of view He can also see the beginning of time. He can feel all of the betrayal and frustration and pain that you and I and every human has ever felt. He sits outside of time, but He is also part of our lives even if we haven’t asked Him to be. He is present in your past and in your future.

We do live like our lives are on a racetrack, but I am reminded of the race tracks that you get as a child. You are in the position of God because you can see the starting line but you can also see the curves and the straight ways. You can see any debris that is possibly there which will cause an accident. You can fix it by removing it or you can allow it to happen and then help with getting the car(life) back on track again. God is in control of all and since He is God, He can choose to get involved in your life and mine a little bit or He can use your life as an example to someone else.

God can see your life and the life of everyone at any point and He is there at any of those points in your life. It is your job to seek Him out and follow Him though. God has left us a Book which gives us some rules to live by and plenty of wisdom to go with it, but just as you had to do in school…you have to learn from it. Not memorize it so much as to get it into your being, into your heart so that you won’t have to remember it when needed. It will just be there, just as He is.

Yes, God does see the end from the beginning and everything in between but it is our choice to come to Him during our “race” of life for advice and counsel so that our life will be useful and an example to others. He is perfect and good, we are not, but He is able to give us the knowledge and ability in this life to be servants and leaders for His Kingdom and as we practice doing those things we will gain the ability to be more in His Kingdom to come.

We have to learn about the “drive” in life so we can complete the course and the only way to do that is to read God’s Book, learn from His wisdom and apply it to our lives every day. Little by little, we can get through the turmoil and hardships which come our way as we go through the trials and the traffic of life, but it is so much easier to do so with God as your driver and coach rather than leaving Him in the “pit crew” after services.

Movement…


It seems that everyone wants some sort of “movement” today. A movement to legalize this or that, one to discourage this behavior or that behavior. Why?

God moved toward us when He sent Jesus to be the substitute for our sacrifice, for our deserved punishment because of sin. He caused a movement in the world because of His love for us which has been making a difference in people’s lives for about two thousand years. Yes, there have been some missteps by those who considered their view of “christian” living and worship to be the only one that was valid but when you step into exclusivity for anything that is the direction you are going.

The only exclusive part of Christian life is that Jesus said  “I am the resurrection, and the life: he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live:” John 11:25. He is the Life and the Way to Heaven, there is no other path to take which can get you there. Jesus is our exclusive and inclusive way to eternity.

Why do I say that He is inclusive when there is so much division in the church all over the world? Because it is not the sinner which God and Jesus hate, it is the sin and the lifestyle of sin which they hate. You are loved by God as if you are the only person on Earth but if you are living in a sinful life, it is the lifestyle and the sins that you are committing which God hates…not you.

He created each of us as a person whom He could have a relationship with. He came down and walked with Adam before the fall in Eden and that is what He wants to do with you. Knowing about Him, listening to sermons, reading the Bible and going to church are wonderful in and of themselves BUT those things will not save your soul! Belief in Jesus and in His life and that He died for your sins is what will save you. Follow Him daily, confess your sinful life and repent of those sins so that others can see a change in your life that they will want in their life!

If there is no change in your life, then it is likely that a change has not occurred in your heart! God loves all of us, but He requires obedience and always has! Words and attendance of a church service or two don’t count. Reading the Bible is good but if you have not believed in the One Who wrote those words,,,it is just a book. Living your life according to a “code of conduct” is a great thing as long as the One Who wrote the code is our Creator and our Redeemer, Jesus Christ.

You can live by a moral code which many people do. One that is acceptable to the world, such as the so-called “golden rule”, but living by that rule will not save your soul. Being a peace-loving person and doing no harm to anyone is nice, but it will not save your soul…only belief in Jesus will do that. Yes, Christianity is a movement and it is one which is not accepted by many in our world today because it is a movement toward God and away from sin. It is a movement which causes us to reject the “accepted” way of living for the life of a servant of God.

It does require repentance from your old habits and ways and turning toward God  and His ways.

Worry, doubts and fears


It seems that every day people are bombarded with more things which cause fear and anxiety. We doubt ourselves at times, and we have fears which cause us to worry about things which we can’t control. What can we do about this? Can we do anything about this situation? It depends upon your situation and your faith.

Some people claim that they can handle their own lives and they don’t need to have “blind faith” in religion to help them get through life. The problem with this kind of attitude is that when push comes to shove and things get a bit out of hand, most will seek out a “higher power” for comfort and direction even if they claim that they don’t believe in a “higher power”. God is that One Who is higher than all, Jesus is the One Who can relate to our suffering and our pain and they can help in all of life’s situations no matter what!

With all of the news that is available to us on the Internet and television today, there is very little which goes on in the world that we can’t keep tabs on whether we truly want to or need to or not. All of this information can cause us to worry far more than is healthy, and the worst part is that we shouldn’t worry about it at all. God is in control of it all. He is watching and guiding your life and mine toward that day when He will call us home.

Yes, one day the whole world will see that we are important to our Creator. Important enough that He will be returning soon, much sooner than most think. Many people are going to be surprised and terrified when that day comes and the church, the believers who are waiting for His call, all disappear and are taken to Heaven. Then they will want to believe, but it will be harder to do so. Many explanations will be given which have nothing to do with God or the Bible’s prophecies but just as in the days of Noah, when the door to the ark was shut the only ones saved were the ones inside.

We don’t have “blind faith” in a God Who is not there. He is the Creator because there is no way that all of this universe could come into being as it is because of an accident. Our own solar system, out of all the ones that have been discovered, is the only one that is stable and with orbits for all of the planets that allow for life to flourish. All of the hundreds of solar systems that have been discovered are too close to their star or too far-flung to harbor life.

God loves all of us, no matter what your skin color is or your culture, but we refuse His provision and His grace when we try to take His place. When we think that we know better than He does how to fulfill our lives in this world, we are deluding ourselves. Seek God in the Bible or at a church which teaches from His Word. Pray that your life can have meaning in and through Him and seek His wisdom every day. This is the best way to relieve stress and worry because He is the One Who holds tomorrow in His hand. All that we have is today.

Live today for Jesus and then do it again tomorrow, then repeat until He comes again. That is the prescription which will conquer worry, doubt and fears far better than anything that a doctor can give you.

Is your life broken?


We hear about people who are broken in spirit and in their lives too. Broken is, sometimes, a state of mind but occasionally it is a state of being. We feel as if life and the things which we are doing just don’t work anymore, so it feels broken and cracked. Sometimes the brokenness is felt spiritually, like our prayer life and our connection to God just doesn’t seem to be working anymore.

Breaking news! It isn’t God Who broke the connection, it is something in your life and mine which does that. Something that we have said or thought about or maybe even something that we did that is a…sin. It puts a wall up around us and our daily living until we confess it, ask forgiveness for it and then get back into our relationship with God. That is when the mending begins. Sometimes the cracks in our life appear as sorrow for something that we can’t put our finger on. Occasionally, those cracks come to us in the form of depression which can make them seem even bigger than they really are.

A state of brokenness is survivable, whether it feels like you can get through it or not is your own perception. God can help you to get through it and you will be stronger in your faith and your connection to Him for going through it. It isn’t fun, but it is necessary sometimes. We get to a point and feel like things aren’t going our way anymore, and we don’t know why. We can’t pinpoint it, particularly the cause of the “not right” point, it is just elusive and out there like a feeling that we have and we just don’t know what it is.

God can give you the peace that you seek in this circumstance, but you have to seek Him first. His position hasn’t moved but ours is all over the place at times. There are days when we aren’t very far from Him and then we have days where we don’t even feel His presence at all in our lives. Those are the days where we feel as if we have fallen through one of those cracks in our lives, and sometimes it feels like it is over a mile deep. We may survive the fall, but when we hit the bottom it seems that there just isn’t a way out. Like we have nothing to hold onto.

We do have God, even in those dark places. He is there and His Word is always available if we will just cling to it and read it, study it, meditate on its wisdom and pray, PRAY, PRAY!!!

Is it broken? Can it be fixed? Your life and all of the parts of it that seem to be broken can be fixed, but not by you. God can fix it. I know the newspapers and magazines say that He hasn’t fixed it yet, but He will and He can. He hasn’t fixed our world because there are so many people who don’t care to know Him and aren’t listening to Him and His messengers. Life is broken to an extent because of the fall in Eden, but also because of our disobedience to God’s laws and His Word. God did not break your life or mine, we have done that.

We go through our days and weeks thinking that everything will be OK, regardless of what we do but God is still in control, especially when we aren’t. If you are not a Christian then your life is your own or it belongs to the worldly lusts and whims that you pursue. Most people don’t want to hear about or know that Satan is alive and well on Earth and he is completely happy with you not knowing God. As a matter of fact, that is his job…to keep you from knowing and giving your life to the service of God and Jesus. Your life goes right along like it should for the most part, but there is always that little bit of tension.

At some point that little bit of tension breaks, and causes an argument or a shooting which will blow your life completely out of the water. This is exactly what the world wants and it’s what Satan wants. To bring your life down around you so that your witness won’t matter, your ministry won’t matter because your life, your family, your health is gone. This is what happens when you get on the list and when Satan targets you and your family…something breaks and becomes broken. The only fix for it is to trust in and turn to God. Amen.