When speaking to Timothy he said: But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God— having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.
2 Tim. 3:1-5 NIV
Our Era is an Era of thanklessness. It was prophesied by Paul that the spirit of thanklessness would come, the question is why? Perhaps it is because the devil knew that if we had a thankful spirit, a mind set naturally to be grateful, we all would look upon the sacrifice of Jesus on and all the way up to the cross, and be so grateful that we would all turn to follow Him. Perhaps that is why the devil fights to keep us ungrateful. Being ungrateful damages your soul. A soul with the Holy Spirit in it will always lean toward gratitude even if things are bad, because the Spirit knows that even when the season we are in is hard God has still given us things to be thankful for. Those who give in to thankless attitudes permit their souls to be damaged and they become jaded.
Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, since as members of one body you were called to peace. And be thankful.
Colossians 3:15 NIV
We can find peace in situations that call for chaos due to the Holy Spirit within us. That is something to thank God for. Much of Paul’s writings seem to be a call to action. When Paul here says and be thankful I feel he is using it as a weapon against the enemy. Your peace that comes from Jesus is a weapon against the devil, your thankfulness that comes from Jesus is a weapon against the devil. So be thankful and use it as a defense against our enemy.
If you disagree that Paul is calling us as soldiers to use thankfulness as a weapon, then check out Chpt. 4 verse 2:
Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.
Colossians 4:2 NIV
Thankfulness is a weapon. So wield that weapon today as you look around at what you have and thank God even for the bread crumbs. Praise Him for He is holy and worthy to be praised.
Happy Thanksgiving
Category: searching
The Shepherds humility
This weekend was my last weekend for camping before winter comes. My dog and I took our first day at our camp spot to go hiking. The fall colors were beautiful and we went for a long hike down the trails. At the end of the trail we had chosen we ended up in a farmer’s field. He had just finished taking off all of his wheat and the sharp unbending stocks stood in our way. My dog is a Jack Russell, so he’s not very tall. The stocks were too high for him so I had to pick him up and carry him. We have been hiking for a really long time or else I would have turned us around and taken us back the way we had come. But the road lay ahead of us just beyond the field so I picked my dog up and carried him in my arms. He’s not a very light Jack Russell. He was too heavy to carry in my arms the whole way so I placed him up on my shoulders, like shepherds do with sheep. In doing this I realized a couple of things. We often see images of Jesus carrying lambs (representing us) on His shoulders as He traverses a rocky or dangerous area. He is always carrying the lamb on His shoulders, because that’s what shepherds do. When I placed my Jack Russell, who’s considerably lighter than a lamb, up on my shoulders it caused my body to bend forward in a position of bowing humility toward the terrain that I was navigating. Holding his little feet on either side of my neck and having him trust that I wouldn’t let him fall all seemed to he symbolic of the way Jesus carries us. And of the way He carried the cross. He humbled Himself. We hear people say that all the time but do we really acknowledge what it means. He humbled Himself. Bowing is often a sign of respect or humility. I see Jesus bowed under the weight of the cross on His back and shoulders, like He would have carried the lamb in the images we see. When Jesus placed the cross on His back, He was carrying us every one of us. Every person, every name that would ever exist was attached to that cross, when He sacrificed Himself for our sins. And like the images we see of Him carrying the little lamb on His shoulders, He had to bow forward. To put a sacrifice of humility on someone who didn’t ever need to be humbled, God didn’t need to humble Himself, if anyone had the right to not be humble, it’s the guy who created the whole world. But He still chose to humble Himself for us, in dying on the cross, in carrying the cross, in carrying us He had to bow forward to take the strain and the weight of our sins upon Himself as He carries us forward toward the end goal. We can’t do it on our own, we just don’t have it in us. We can try and we will fail, but He will never fail. Like I said earlier we have to trust Him, as He places us on His shoulders, to never drop us. But He won’t, He’s God, He loves us. And He buys Himself forward to take our weight on to Him, because that’s just who He is.
Happy October 1
Signs of love
Signs of love
We all talk about signs of life. I even have a favorite album by that title. But do we discuss the signs of love? As I have been staying in our trailer during these fading months of warm weather, I have had the same picture to look at every morning. It’s a photo of the design a puffer fish makes when he is trying to attract a mate. The male fish will dig his body into the soft sand of the sea floor and score into it many intricate lines until he has made a picture he is proud of, then the female fish sees the picture done just for her and goes to him. It’s his sign of love.
God also leaves signs of love for us. Flowers. Butterflies. Seashells. Sunsets. Extras.
Sherlock Holmes once said: “Flowers show me that God is good. We need food and air and water to survive, but flowers are an extra.”
God shows His love for us in the extras that we take for granted each day. So many feel like God doesn’t love them, simply because they don’t know how to look for the signs of His love. In the big miracles yes, but also in the psithurism as the wind tickles the trees, also in the soft sand beneath your feet, also in the smile of a loved one, the twitch of a bunny’s nose, the wag of an old dog’s tail. Look for the extras. The signs that God loves you enough to do things to make you smile, things that you don’t even give Him credit for. Next time you smell a flower or gaze at a sunset remember, that’s an extra and it shows that God loves you.
Do not forsake
not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.
Hebrews 10:25 KJV
7am on a Sunday. Other people are still in bed and look to a day of doing nothing. But you are up and getting the coffee on. Walk the dog. Get dressed for the day and grab your stuff for the Sunday service. Are you a greeter? Part of the worship team? The person who sweeps snow off the sidewalk before Church? Maybe you are the pastor. Give it another couple of hours and the congregation will be there. They too got up on a day when PJs and hot chocolate would have been so much more pleasant. In come the body of Christ and you all sit down and chat. Then the worship starts and you praise God. Then the pastor comes and you hear God’s word. Then you go home.
It sounds so simple. This ‘Church’ thing. But it is one of the most important things you will do in your week. Too many have come into the habit of streaming Church from their living room and making the effort to become part of a Church family. Don’t get me wrong, the fact that we can stream Church is great! And there are days when you can’t get to Church physically and need to live stream. The fact that that is possible is a blessing. But it shouldn’t be all you do. Church is so much more than a sermon from the pulpit. It’s a place where you can serve God. You get to physically be part of a Church family and to have that happen it takes commitment and effort on your part. You have to keep attending and start volunteering, doing little things that connect you to the people and the pastor. God does not want us to stop gathering with other believers. That might not look like Church as we know it in up coming days. It may look like a home Church or a small group. It may be simply someone reading the Bible as you gather together and then discuss God’s words. For many people Church is a secret and dangerous affair. These people could spend time with God on their own each week and not risk getting caught by gathering with other Christians. Yet they gather anyway. Why? Because they understand the power and importance of being with other Christians. They get that we need to encourage and be encouraged. We need prayer circles and a safe place to go where Jesus is the center. Though the body is in peril or discomfort their souls know they are safe there with others like them.
If they can gather together, why can’t we? Why would we even consider stopping? Our greatest worry is whether or not we feel like crawling out our warm beds. And yet we consider staying home and simply streaming. We must gather in the upper rooms we have been gifted. Whether that’s a Church building or someone’s home, or perhaps a hidden chamber in the basement of some forgotten building where our enemies cannot find us. No matter what it looks like we must continue to gather.
Who have you been whispering to?
Who have you been whispering to?
When you see someone sinning do not talk about them to others- talk about them to God. We tend to see sin in those we care about, or in simply the people around us, and we do the exact opposite of what we are supposed to do. We talk about them. But what we should be doing is praying for them. Only the Holy Spirit can fix sin. If he or she is someone you know well are comfortable with, perhaps you could find a gentle way of pointing the sin out. But in the end that person has to choose to not sin anymore. If your close friend is talking about suddenly enjoying alcohol and you know that the temptation to become a drunk is there (this is a sin by the way. There are those who claim drunkenness is not, but it is.) It would be wrong to not try and dissuade him or her from the temptation. If your friends are watching bad movies and you act like that’s okay, then you are encouraging their sin. I am thinking of myself here. I was watching a show last year that had a nude scene. You didn’t really see anything but it was obvious what was happening. I kept watching because I figured it was fine as long as you didn’t see anything. My dad happened to be over at the time and he pointed out that the show was bad. Suddenly I realized my error and sin and was able to shut it off. No song on the radio or movie on Netflix is worth losing your relationship with God over. But the other day I had a person I know well mention something they were doing that I knew right away was a sin. This person is a professing Christian. Yet there it was. I mentioned that it wasn’t really something a Christian should do and got shot down. So I went and discussed the whole thing with my close friend. I was greatly troubled. But in the end all we could do was talk about the person and speak badly about this person, because once you mention one thing a person is doing wrong to someone else a thousand other things you’ve seen him or her do come to mind. That was no solution. I then felt God say. ‘You shouldn’t talk to others about people. You should talk to me and let me help them.’
It’s true. Only God can help these people. He knows their hearts and what is going on, and He is never there just to criticize. God is there to guide and help. In the end He will judge us. But for now He is doing His best to help us, if only we would stop trying to be Him and start letting Him be in control.
So. Next time. I personally will pray when worried about someone and will work hard to not simply talk behind their backs, which is a sin I need to work on. And I am sure many of the rest of you who are shaking your heads at me in disgust are guilty of this too. We all are. And we all need to try and do better.
Why do we worship?
Why do we worship before the sermon?
Have you ever wondered why we worship before the pastor starts speaking? Of course most would say ‘it’s to praise God.’ Some might say, ‘it’s to give time for late comers to find their seats.’ Both are accurate. Yet it’s more than just praise to God. Worship is about getting into the right head space and heart space. We enter church with the world’s problems following behind us.
“My TV broke and I don’t have money for a new one. Do I really need a new one? Is it important? But I like watching the Christian stations. But the other stations can have such terrible things on them.” “My cat keeps scratching the couch. What can I do? Do I need a cover?”
So on and so on, our minds go.
These things distract from the word of God and the time spent with Him. The worship is a physical act and takes a physical action. We sing and our mind moves to the music. Soon our hearts are taken by the words and eventually we feel the Holy Spirit raise our hands and we praise. Then the sermon comes and we are ready. Even before prayer we can get into a better headspace by spending some time in worship and focusing on God. Sometimes I personally find lighting a candle helps. Little Things that Aid your mind in their thoughts and focus. Sometimes pacing and walking helps you focus on God. But these are things you can’t do at church when the pastor is about to speak. What we can do is worship and get our minds and our hearts out of our day-to-day problems and on to God, and soon we will see that God has answers for all of these problems. Perhaps God won’t tell you if you should or should not buy a couch cover to keep your cat from scratching it. But He will guide you in your need for financing or your health problems or even the fight you had with your neighbors. If you are open to Him God will show you what to do in all your life. But first you need to focus and that’s where worship helps.
Is the old Testament necessary today?
Is the old Testament necessary today?
We all hear it said. We have even said. “That’s old Testament stuff.” We say it as though the old Testament is no longer relevant. We say it as though it is something we have progressed past.
Old Testament is a term that came from the Biblical referral to the old covenant which required animal sacrifice, and the new covenant which is Jesus’s sacrifice. Calling the books that went from Genesis to Malachi old Testament and the books that went from Matt. To Revelation New Testament, began in 130 AD by a Bishop who was separating the books this way for clarity in a letter he was writing. Shows as easily things catch on.
We see old as a bad word. A subversive content that we need to avoid. I actually heard a girl the other day, (she was probably 14yrs old,) say, after looking at a designation plaque that honored an old lady who had passed away after being a patriarch of the area we were in, “why would they give that to her?” (Tone is everything in the illustration so try and hear the degrading whine in the voice) her mom explained the memorial. She then said, “so what? They just give these to old people. I don’t want her to have it.”
Welcome to 2023. Anyway. This is how old is seen. Not relevant or valuable. So the term ‘old’ being used for the pre-Jesus covenant marks the book unfairly.
So many who are confronted by the Old Testament want to do away with it. They do the, “Jesus made it irrelevant. Paul said it’s the law of death.” Thing. Yet Jesus Himself said:
“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.
Matt. 5:17 NIV
And Paul was addressing learned Jewish men as well as gentiles when he was speaking. These statements were for these men who were using the law to empower themselves and contorting it to fit their own agendas. The law they commanded was the law of death Paul meant. I would even go so far as to say that what is being preached in certain Churches today, that has been contrived from scripture and then mutilated to fit certain non offensive agendas, has become a law of death too. It’s no longer the Truth that guides you to Heaven, it’s just nice platitudes that fills seats and not souls. Working the Bible to your own life and choices is what the Pharisees and Sadducees did that caused many problems and eventually led Paul to make his bold statement. The Pharisees and Sadducees started out as great people. Dedicated to God and on the right path, until they slid off that path and started using their positions to further themselves instead of God. Sounds like many preachers today, doesn’t it?
However we are now off track. Jesus quoted the Old Testament when battling the devil. Paul himself often quoted the Old Testament. Matt. Mark. Luke and John quoted the Old Testament. If the guys who established the New Testament found the Old relevant enough to refer to it and quote it, then what makes us think that we have moved to a place of spiritual enlightenment that we can throw it away? It’s because a lot of the hard truths are in the Old Testament, truths we want to hide from so we ignore them. Yet most of those truths, rules and warnings were reestablished by either Jesus Himself or one of the New Testament writers. And Don’t forget. If you throw out the Old Testament you also lose all the Psalms. How many of us rely on those Psalms to get us through a tough week?
Jesus made it clear with His own words that the Old Testament is still relevant and valuable and necessary, who are we to argue with Him?
Are you waiting for answers?
Are you waiting for answers?
The promise of God does not always come fast. So don’t start doubting even if you have waited 10 or 20 years. He has His time.
Why do we become downcast and fearful when we have a God who loves us? When we have Faith in God and know He is God and He can and will deliver, why do we doubt?
James says that the doubters should expect to receive nothing from God.
But Jesus said ‘if you have faith the size of a mustard seed.’ So where is the cut off?
At what point does faith only the size of a mustard seed turn to doubt?
In the moment where you used to say ‘I know God can do this.’
And now you say, ‘God probably won’t do this.’
You aren’t doubting that God is real or that He is there, but you are doubting that He will answer you. I say this more to myself than anyone else because I have had too many of those moments.
(I have also had moments of complete doubt that God would answer and He did, probably because He knew that I needed to see Him do something because I was slipping. He is still good to us.)
His Word warns us that if we doubt who He is and what He will do that He won’t answer us. That’s not having only a little Faith when we pray. That’s having no Faith at all. We must believe or how else can we expect to see answers.
Now. There are times when we have Faith and still don’t see an answer. There were times like that all through the Bible. But our Faith cannot depend on what we see God doing, it has to depend on who God is. Our Faith is in God not in the works of God. We have to trust Him.
Built on the Graves of the children
Built on the Graves of the Children.
It has been said that certain modern cities were built on the Graves of the children. The ones who were left orphans, the ones who starved in the subway stations, the ones who were abandoned. Perhaps most cities could say this. But what about in our modern cities? What about the city around you? What about now? The city keeps on growing and changing, is it still being built on the Graves of the children? Or perhaps we shouldn’t say city, but rather, society. Modern society is being built on the Graves of our children.
The government tells us what we can and cannot say, and can and cannot agree with. Things that should be obviously wrong are being not only promoted to but forced upon our children. Kids so little that they can’t even write their names yet, are being told that they aren’t actually boys or girls. They are being told that if you are a boy and like flowers than you must be a girl deep down and should change. Or if you are a girl and like monster trucks you must actaually be a boy. I had a six year old come home from school who had been taught that day that big foot was real and was a fault in evolution. Come on people! Schools are teaching your children that big foot is real to promote evolution. Little children are being read stories in class that cover certain kinds of explicit sex so they are taught to be inclusive, and we don’t think that this is a problem? You shouldn’t be teaching any kind of sex to these kids. They are kids. We often hear about the death of innocence and it is too true. Super heros who once stood for justice and truth and told your kids to stay in school and not do drugs are now cussing and torturing people. Kids are told that if they don’t support certain people that they aren’t heros but villains. Kids are told that lying is okay. That hurting people is okay. They are being sent home from school with notes from their teachers saying that it was against school policy to bring their Bibles to read, not out loud, not in class, but quietly to themselves during lunch period. Because our Bibles are banned from being read privately in the class room but books that describe that most intimate parts of a sexual relationship are being read out loud by the teachers.
Kids aren’t being permitted to think for themselves or to choose for themselves, they are being ground into mindless society conformists who do and think as the TV and the government tell them to.
Now tell me. Is our society being built on the Graves of the children? On the minds that no longer know what an intimate friendship looks like because of the lies the government shouts in their ears. On the minds that don’t know wrong from right because everything is grey. On the minds that should be out there playing and envisioning butterflies that can take them to other worlds, but instead have lost the innocence of stories for the government agenda. When will we let kids be kids again and stop shoving adult problems down their throats? When will we stop building our warped society on the Graves of their innocence? When will freedom, true freedom, return? Perhaps not until the return of our Savior. But until then we are called to be occupiers and to help grow the next generation. Are we helping them grow? Or are we turning a blind eye as they are fading into the cracks? Stop digging the Graves that will bury your children. Fill in the holes and lead them to a safe place where the entity of this world can’t touch them. And remeber that Jesus loves your children more than you do, so don’t be afraid to trust Him with them and to bring them to Him where they are truly free.
Everyone welcome?
Everyone welcome?
I have noticed that certain groups who claim the title ‘church’ have decided to plant an ‘Everyone welcome’ slogan under their banners. We all know what they are gesturing at. But it made me feel like something should be said.
All Churches. All! Welcome Everyone to come and join. But the true Church refuses to dumb down or corrupt the Bible’s teaching just to make certain people happy. Guess what? There are parts of the Bible that are offensive to everyone. The lady who has just started attending after being involved in a messy legal custody battle may be offended by the verse that says to love your enemies, or the verses that tell about divorce being a sin. The man who has attended Church his whole life may suddenly notice 1 Thes. 5:12 and 13 says to respect and listen to those in the Church who give you spiritual guidance, but all that does is bring to his mind a mentor he once had who he didn’t like so he feels angry and offended. Do we change the words of God to suit these two people? No. God’s word is meant to be hard to handle at times and sometimes it even hurts or makes us angry. It’s supposed to help us change and guide us into being more like Christ. If the Bible says your lifestyle is a sin, it’s a call to look at yourself and to decide, do I want to live this way? Or do I want to change and become a new person through Christ? If you’re a mess and the Bible points it out that doesn’t mean it’s closing the doors on you, and neither is the Church that continues to preach the Truth, it means that the Bible and the Church are trying to help you and to guide you out of your mess and sin and into the fullness of living for Jesus. News flash. We all came through the front door of the Church with a set of sins. But that’s why we’re at Church. To sit down and listen to God and hear what He has to say. And when it’s uncomfortable and feels offensive, we choose to look at ourselves and see what God is calling us to change. If you want the Church to change what it says so you feel comfortable there, than you have missed the point of Church. It’s not here to make us feel good and then we go home, it’s here to prepare is to go forward as true followers of Christ. Everyone is welcome. But come expecting to be changed. That’s why we go. Because we want to be more like Him and less like the mess we were when we walked in.
Carried in the cross 