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Archive for the ‘Reflections’ Category

They’re Gifts

21 Dec

We are rapidly approaching Christmas day.  Many gifts will exchange hands.

I want to stop and reflect on your spouse and children.

They’re Gifts from our Lord.

How are you treating your gifts?  Are you grateful for them?  Do you take care of them the way the Lord
wants you to take care of them?

You’ve been given a great gift and a great responsibility.  You have been entrusted with lives.  Entrusted from our Lord with them.  How are you handling it?

Are you helping them seek their loving Creator?  Are you helping them serve their God?

I can tell you that just in looking at my wife and children I know how much God loves me.

They’re gifts, loving gifts, and the number one thing you can do for our Lord is put Him at the head of the household.  Don’t take anything for granted.  We will be held accountable as the head and hearts of our families and what we did for Him.

Ephesians 5: 22-28-22 Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife as Christ is the head of the church, his body, of which he is the Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit to their husbands in everything.

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself.

There is 50% divorce rate in this country and no wife or husband living both by these scriptures are
getting divorced.  There is no ME in these scriptures.  Why can a wife submit to her husband with confidence?  Because he is giving himself up just as Jesus gave Himself for the Church.  That means selfish me goes out the door.

Ephesians 6:1-4- 1 Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. 2 “Honor your father and mother”—which is the first commandment with a promise— 3 “that it may go well with you and that you may enjoy long life on the earth.” 4 Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the
training and instruction of the Lord.

What’s a family that’s hitting on all cylinders (at least for fallen humans)?  The one that bases the Word of God as its guide.

Thank the Lord this season for your gifts and never take your duties lightly or loved ones for granted.

 
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Posted in Encouragement, Inspiration, Motivation, Reflections

 

Does Just Believing In God Make You Saved?

16 Dec

Satan believes in God.  Is he saved?

Satan believes that Jesus lived.  Is he saved?

I hear so many times that if you just believe, you will be saved.  However, that’s extremely vague.  What is it that you believe?

Romans 10:8-10 –  8 But what does it say? “The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,” that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming: 9 That if you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved.

Lord?

That’s Lord, the one who rules over your life.  You’re not just believing He lived but you confess Him as Lord.  God in the flesh.  Authority given over to Him from the Father to save those which are lost.

If you believe that there is a higher power, that’s not saved.  If you believe Jesus was a good teacher and walked the earth, that’s not saved.  Satan believes in those things too.

You must believe in your heart AND confess with your mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord and that God raised Him from the dead.

 
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Posted in Inspiration, Reflections

 

Be Careful With Updated Bible Translations

07 Dec

In the day and age we live in you always have to be careful.

I have always been a NIV Translation guy.  I always cross reference things to get a better understanding, but found it to be the easiest to read when I was growing in the Word 18 years ago.

Today the NIV has done a new translation for 2011.  In my posts I mostly use the NIV 1984 with some KJV.

Why?  Here’s an example:

Proverbs 14:12 – 12 There is a way that appears to be right, 
but in the end it leads to death.

Huh?  Right to whom?  Right in what way?

It actually upsets me very much.  Here is the 1984 NIV:

Proverbs 14:12 – 12 There is a way that seems right to a man, 
but in the end it leads to death.

Oh!  Now I get it.  Man’s thinking is not good.  He thinks he’s right and it ends up leading to death.

Who are we worry worried about offending that we would change the scripture.  All the other common versions from the past use “to man.”

Political correctness has crept into our Word of God now and if we’re not careful they will change the meaning if they find it offensive.

The word man refers to both man and woman.

The same is happening in the pulpits.  Don’t offend anyone.  Speak positively and make the church grow.  Don’t speak of sin, it’s unpopular.

We have to be innocent as doves but as shrewd as snakes.

Matthew 10:16 – 16 I am sending you out like sheep among wolves. Therefore be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves.

Just like the real Word of God it states in the last days people will stray from the Truth and follow doctrines from demons.

1 Timothy 4:1 –  1The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons.

Study God’s Word to seek Truth, because it does matter to God.  You’re opinion may mean a lot in this day and age in this country, but that isn’t the truth to God.

 
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The Importance Of The Truth

02 Dec

John 8:32- 32 Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.”

What’s the importance of the Truth?

It’s the difference between Heaven and Hell and eternity with the Lord or without.  The total importance of your whole existence is on the line.  That’s the importance of the Truth.

So what is Truth?

John 14:6- 6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

 Do we seek Truth or do we seek what’s true to us?

The difference affects eternity.

 
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Posted in Encouragement, Inspiration, Motivation, Reflections

 

I Will Be Glad

29 Nov

Psalm 9:2 – 2 I will be glad and rejoice in you; I will sing the praises of your name, O Most High.

It’s a choice.

Look around and see how many people take their eyes off the Lord.  They are not glad.  Nothing but the Lord and His Love fulfills.

So many people have the ability to purchase anything they want.  Do whatever they want.  Most are not happy and some to the point that they want to end their earthly lives.

Others are sentenced to death for their faith in God and rejoice until their last breath.

Choose to be glad, the Lord loves you and gave His life so that you may be with Him forever.  Choose to rejoice and choose to praise Him.

Or choose not to.  It does matter to Him, don’t kid yourself into thinking that it doesn’t.

 
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Posted in Inspiration, Motivation, Reflections

 

Old Testament Offering Of Thankfulness

23 Nov

Leviticus 7:12-15 – 12 “‘If they offer it as an expression of thankfulness, then along with this thank offering they are to offer thick loaves made without yeast and with olive oil mixed in, thin loaves made without yeast and brushed with oil, and thick loaves of the finest flour well-kneaded and with oil mixed in. 13 Along with their fellowship offering of thanksgiving they are to present an offering with thick loaves of bread made with yeast. 14 They are to bring one of each kind as an offering, a contribution to the LORD; it belongs to the priest who splashes the blood of the fellowship offering against the altar. 15 The meat of their fellowship offering of thanksgiving must be eaten on the day it is offered; they must leave none of it till morning.

The Jews were encouraged in one of their types of sacrifices to be thankful.

God gave us a gift to be able to reflect on how you would feel if you were in somebody else’s shoes.  There is only one true God.  However can put ourselves in the place of doing something for someone and then seeing how grateful they are.  No one appreciates someone who is self centered or ungrateful.  

We need always to reflect on our Lord during Thanksgiving.  We all have so much to be thankful for.  Enjoy your families.  Don’t waste an opportunity to try and plant seeds where the door is open.  In America we get caught up in the sale or success that follows, but our Lord just wants us to love and obey Him.  If you love Him feed His sheep.  John 21:15-17

 
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Posted in Inspiration, Motivation, Reflections

 

Blood Covenant

20 Nov

Matthew 26:28- 28 This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.

He died for you.  He died for all of us.  There is a covenant.

The covenant is that we accept His death on the cross in the place of our own death.  We now need to
repent of our sins and worldly ways.  We need to make Him Lord.  That means die to our own selfish life without Him.

When your name goes into the Lamb’s Book of Life, we’re now in a covenant.  This is one covenant we
can’t afford to break or turn our backs on.  Seek Him.

 
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Posted in Encouragement, Inspiration, Reflections

 

The Darkness Doesn’t Understand

13 Nov

John  1:5- 5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.

John 1:1-5 tells us much about our Lord Jesus.  He was with God in the beginning.  E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G that has been made was made with Jesus involved.  Many mistakes doctrinally are made because they don’t realize that.  Then we get to our verse.

Jesus is the Light.  What does that mean?  How does a comic signify when someone gets an idea?  A light bulb is drawn in a bubble above his head.

If you are in a pitch black room, what do you see?  Nothing, you see nothing.

That is what life is like without Jesus.  Those who don’t have Him see nothing.  Those who have a little itty bit of the light, see a little itty bit.

Those who have a lot of the light have turned their lives over to Jesus.

He is the Light.  God is Wisdom.  You can have all the worldly intelligence in the world; literally a genius and you can still be in darkness with no understanding of what’s most important.

So how do we find the light?  By climbing out of our own selfish cave and towards the Truth and Creator.  The devil has been around a lot longer than all of us and he still doesn’t understand it. 

You know all those people that say you just have to have blind faith and believe?  In this day and age that is incorrect.  You can search, seek and study daily.  You don’t have to have blind faith and just believe.  You can draw nearer to the Light.  However, time has shown that to do that, you have to leave your dark selfish cave.

 
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Quote – Keith Green

11 Nov

I’d rather have people hate me with the knowledge that I tried to save them.
Keith Green

 

Clearly it’s the Lord that saves and our job to spread the Word and Good News.

After we die and some of our friends didn’t choose Jesus how will we feel if we didn’t really try to share Him with them?  Did we care about them?  Did we really love them?

That’s what I get out of Keith Green’s quote.  It may come off a little strong and our job isn’t to pester to the point they run away, but too many of us never mention Him at all to others or the ones we love.

Don’t stand in front of the Lord or regret that you didn’t at least try to share Jesus with those you love.

 
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Posted in Quotes

 

Galatians 4:8

06 Nov

Galatians 4:8 – 8 Formerly, when you did not know God, you were slaves to those who by nature are not gods.

A slave to those who are not God?  When mankind fell we inherited a sinful gene.  However, like this verse indicates those who are not serving God are still listening to someone.  There is a spiritual realm all around us and influences are coming from those who left with Satan in the rebellion.

It’s not by chance that the secular world is just by accident leading us to a one world order.  They don’t believe they are doing it so the devil may have his day to control everyone.  They think with all
the nukes and biological warfare we will destroy ourselves unless we all come together.  However, it makes no difference as they are listening to the voices that are contrary to God.

Protect yourself from ungodly demonic ideas.  Get into God’s Word and pray that He leads you into the right direction.

 
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Posted in Inspiration, Reflections

 
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