Ecclesiastes 3:11b “He has put eternity in their hearts.”
Brother and Sister James Owens were fixtures on the South Carolina Church of God Campground for years. Though short in statue, Brother Owens always made a big impression on you when you talked with him. He and Sister Owens ran the kitchen for SCCOG Youth Camps for many years and were great neighbors and friends for our family. He had a little fish pond in his yard and I would always take my two oldest granddaughters to see the fish when they were little. They were just two wonderful people to love and know.
When we were getting out of the car last Wednesday night after church Becky said, "I sure do miss seeing Brother and Sister Owens on the camp ground." I remarked that I did too and looked at the house and yard they had for 28 years. But then Becky added, "But they're shouting on the hills of glory and have made it to their permanent home."
During the last few years, before their home-going, you could see the toil that sickness and age had on them. It was a sad time to see them leave their home here and move in with their son and family. Not seeing Sister Owens working on the flowers in her yard or Brother Owens on his golf cart took some getting used to. No matter when you visited with them they had one thought on their minds and an in their hearts-eternity. God was very gracious and took them home very close together. I'm positive they are shouting on the hills of glory.
Like all of us, they were on a journey. Earth is not our final destination; we are just passing through. We will never feel totally at home here, because heaven is our eternal home. The house the Owens lived in is still there, so is the little fish pond, and some of the flowers she planted. A new family has brought life back to the household, but Brother and Sister Owens have made their journey to their final destination-heaven.
How about you? Are you sure you will go to heaven when you die? You can be if you know Jesus. He already has many mansions prepared and there's one waiting for you if your name is in the Book of Life.
Wednesday, February 15, 2017
Monday, February 13, 2017
Is He Not A Carpenter?
Mark 6:3 "Is not this the carpenter?”
It was not too strange that the people of His own village did not accept Him, They knew Him so well that they didn’t know Him really at all. They said, “Anyone who grew up in our village and played with our children and worked in his father’s wood shop, can’t be all that wise or have power to work miracles.
Something is wrong here.
"He is a carpenter; we’ve known him for years.” Jesus Himself said that, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own country and among his own kin and in his own house” in Mark 6:5.
It is possible to know a multitude of facts about Jesus and miss the important fact of who He is and why He came. The result of their knowing Him too well was that He could do no mighty work there.
Unbelief is not a trivial weakness or a mild annoyance. It is powerful. Here it stayed the hand of God. Never underestimate the power of unbelief. Nothing can subdue it but faith in who Jesus really is and what He can really do.
There are many good people who have been through Sunday School lessons, listened to sermons and faithfully read through their Bible so many times. including preachers and other Christian workers, that they run the danger of becoming overfamiliar with the Sublime.
Our need in prayer today is to ask the Spirit of God to keep us from knowing more and more about Jesus and less and less about why He came, who He really is and how much He can really do for us and in us.
It was not too strange that the people of His own village did not accept Him, They knew Him so well that they didn’t know Him really at all. They said, “Anyone who grew up in our village and played with our children and worked in his father’s wood shop, can’t be all that wise or have power to work miracles.
Something is wrong here.
"He is a carpenter; we’ve known him for years.” Jesus Himself said that, “A prophet is not without honor except in his own country and among his own kin and in his own house” in Mark 6:5.
It is possible to know a multitude of facts about Jesus and miss the important fact of who He is and why He came. The result of their knowing Him too well was that He could do no mighty work there.
Unbelief is not a trivial weakness or a mild annoyance. It is powerful. Here it stayed the hand of God. Never underestimate the power of unbelief. Nothing can subdue it but faith in who Jesus really is and what He can really do.
There are many good people who have been through Sunday School lessons, listened to sermons and faithfully read through their Bible so many times. including preachers and other Christian workers, that they run the danger of becoming overfamiliar with the Sublime.
Our need in prayer today is to ask the Spirit of God to keep us from knowing more and more about Jesus and less and less about why He came, who He really is and how much He can really do for us and in us.
Thursday, February 9, 2017
Wait!
Psalm 27:14 “Wait for the Lord: be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord!”
Wait simply means, "to defer action or departure for a specified time or until some expected event occurs; to be expectant or on the watch."
In our culture of our hurried lifestyles of deadlines, timelines and fierce competition, the Lord speaks into our lives and says, “Wait for Me.” We become angry with people who drive too slow and become impatient with little children who want us to take time to look at bugs and leaves. Yet, God tells us to be still and wait.
We have instant coffee, instant meals, instant banking and even wireless communication and most people have no patience at all with each other, yet God keeps telling us to be patient and wait on Him and for Him.
This is what He has commanded us:
Psalm 27.14 “Wait for the Lord.”
Psalm 37:7 “Be still before Lord and wait patiently for Him.”
Hosea 12:6 “Maintain love and justice, and wait for your God always.”
There are major benefits of waiting for the Lord:
Isaiah 30:18 “Blessed are all who wait for Him! He rises to show you compassion.”
Isaiah 40:31 “They that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength.”
Isaiah 25:9 “Surely, this is our God; we trust (waited) in him, and he saved us.”
So what should be our declaration to Him?
Isaiah 26:8 “Yes, Lord, walking in the way of your laws, we wait for you; your name and renown are the desires of our heart.”
Psalm 30:5, 6 “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope. My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen for the morning.”
Wait simply means, "to defer action or departure for a specified time or until some expected event occurs; to be expectant or on the watch."
In our culture of our hurried lifestyles of deadlines, timelines and fierce competition, the Lord speaks into our lives and says, “Wait for Me.” We become angry with people who drive too slow and become impatient with little children who want us to take time to look at bugs and leaves. Yet, God tells us to be still and wait.
We have instant coffee, instant meals, instant banking and even wireless communication and most people have no patience at all with each other, yet God keeps telling us to be patient and wait on Him and for Him.
This is what He has commanded us:
Psalm 27.14 “Wait for the Lord.”
Psalm 37:7 “Be still before Lord and wait patiently for Him.”
Hosea 12:6 “Maintain love and justice, and wait for your God always.”
There are major benefits of waiting for the Lord:
Isaiah 30:18 “Blessed are all who wait for Him! He rises to show you compassion.”
Isaiah 40:31 “They that wait on the Lord shall renew their strength.”
Isaiah 25:9 “Surely, this is our God; we trust (waited) in him, and he saved us.”
So what should be our declaration to Him?
Isaiah 26:8 “Yes, Lord, walking in the way of your laws, we wait for you; your name and renown are the desires of our heart.”
Psalm 30:5, 6 “I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I put my hope. My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen for the morning.”
The Book
Joshua 1:8 “Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful.”
Where do you get your standard for living? On what do you base your value system? Do you go to the Bible to weigh your decisions? My pastor Brother, Dennis Stone, has been sharing a lot on this subject lately. It has to do with being subject to God's Word and being committed to stand on it.
When I was a teenager I made the decision to serve and follow the Lord whole-heartedly. He, through the power of the Holy Spirit, began to change my life and called me to preach. I began to have a craving for the Word of God. I couldn’t get enough of it. My spiritual life had been starving before and now I was being fed. I began to soak up the wonderful promises of God and also became aware of the commands of God.
Many people have always attended church; yet, over the years they tend to choose what parts of the Bible they want to believe and what parts they want to ignore. If someone asked then, they would say that they believed the whole Bible as the authority of God, yet they weren’t living that way (what you do is the fruit of what you believe). Many don’t read the Bible everyday, nor do they ask God to direct their daily decisions and actions.
Dennis mentioned during one of his recent sermons that there was a point in his life recently where he had to reaffirm in his mind what he was going to use as his standard for making decisions and giving advice. He chose the Bible. And with that reaffirmation, his stability in the Word is greater and the anointing fresher than ever before.
Romans 12:2 says, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”
As your mind is being renewed, so will your values and standards began to line up with God’s will. The Word of God is your source of strength and power. It will raise your standard of living in ways you can never achieve physically
Where do you get your standard for living? On what do you base your value system? Do you go to the Bible to weigh your decisions? My pastor Brother, Dennis Stone, has been sharing a lot on this subject lately. It has to do with being subject to God's Word and being committed to stand on it.
When I was a teenager I made the decision to serve and follow the Lord whole-heartedly. He, through the power of the Holy Spirit, began to change my life and called me to preach. I began to have a craving for the Word of God. I couldn’t get enough of it. My spiritual life had been starving before and now I was being fed. I began to soak up the wonderful promises of God and also became aware of the commands of God.
Many people have always attended church; yet, over the years they tend to choose what parts of the Bible they want to believe and what parts they want to ignore. If someone asked then, they would say that they believed the whole Bible as the authority of God, yet they weren’t living that way (what you do is the fruit of what you believe). Many don’t read the Bible everyday, nor do they ask God to direct their daily decisions and actions.
Dennis mentioned during one of his recent sermons that there was a point in his life recently where he had to reaffirm in his mind what he was going to use as his standard for making decisions and giving advice. He chose the Bible. And with that reaffirmation, his stability in the Word is greater and the anointing fresher than ever before.
Romans 12:2 says, “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.”
As your mind is being renewed, so will your values and standards began to line up with God’s will. The Word of God is your source of strength and power. It will raise your standard of living in ways you can never achieve physically
Calm Down
When we fly off the handle, there’s a good chance our tank isn’t full. We may normally be predictable, deliberate, and self-controlled, but as soon as our energy levels plummet, so does our ability to respond correctly to others.
Finding strength to be self-controlled sounds like a lot of work. But we don’t have to do so alone. I've found that we tend to marry people who share an equal degree of self-control, and that spouses rub off on each other. When you’re down, hopefully your spouse is “up.”
I also find strength in God’s grace. Grace is that measure of good that I don’t have in myself but which God seems to grant me. I don’t appear alone. A pile of studies suggest that people who practice their faith intentionally enjoy a host of personal, social and physical benefits. For example, faith-filled people tend to experience more social relationships, think the best of others, and report more happiness, life satisfaction, and morale than people who avoid God.
I think we suffer from the narrow idea that self-control is mostly about not doing this or that. What we overlook is the subtle fact that we engage self-control every time we speak and act, and these behaviors, however small, weave together our quality of life. Choosing to not snap back, or not joke harshly, and choosing rather to listen intently or show care enhance our family relationships little by little, act by act. A little self-control goes a long way, especially at home.
Impulsive people tend to respond to others emotionally with little regard for the negative impact of their immediate behavior or the long-term damage to their relationships. While these suggestions will require you to exercise huge willpower, they may help you break out of old patterns. At 63 years of age, I'm still learning these things.
-Wait. Think. Give yourself two seconds to reflect on the facts and then respond.
-Moms have long mastered the “10 minute time out” for kids. Some therapists have found that the same technique works with fighting adults.
-Take a half-day. Settle down, gather your thoughts, think about how the other person is thinking, and come back ready to talk.
Finding strength to be self-controlled sounds like a lot of work. But we don’t have to do so alone. I've found that we tend to marry people who share an equal degree of self-control, and that spouses rub off on each other. When you’re down, hopefully your spouse is “up.”
I also find strength in God’s grace. Grace is that measure of good that I don’t have in myself but which God seems to grant me. I don’t appear alone. A pile of studies suggest that people who practice their faith intentionally enjoy a host of personal, social and physical benefits. For example, faith-filled people tend to experience more social relationships, think the best of others, and report more happiness, life satisfaction, and morale than people who avoid God.
Paul listed self-control as one of several “fruit” that grows from the life of a godly person. He writes, “The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.”
I think we suffer from the narrow idea that self-control is mostly about not doing this or that. What we overlook is the subtle fact that we engage self-control every time we speak and act, and these behaviors, however small, weave together our quality of life. Choosing to not snap back, or not joke harshly, and choosing rather to listen intently or show care enhance our family relationships little by little, act by act. A little self-control goes a long way, especially at home.
Fighting For Good
2 Samuel 23: 11, 12 “The Philistines came together to fight in a vegetable field. Israel’s troops ran away from the Philistines, but Shammah stood in the middle of the field and fought for it and killed the Philistines. And the Lord gave a great victory."
Shammah stood alone against the Philistines while the rest of the Israelites ran away. God gave him a great victory because he was fighting for a good cause.
This past Wednesday night my brother gave a terrific message about fighting for what is good and not backing down because of bitterness. In other words, don't becoming weary in well doing. No quitting allowed because of bitterness. My heart was stirred. I once read a quote that went something like this, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."
We need to keep fighting for good against the things that make us spiritually weak and bitterness tops that category. How can I be blessed if I let bitterness control my life? The person or persons that cause this spirit have long forgotten it, but you have allowed yourself to become a prisoner of it. Bitterness is worse than any other emotion because it does you more harm than good and keeps blessing from flowing in your life.
You and I have to evaluate our lives daily and ask ourselves, "Are we still fighting for the things God has called us too?" It's a good question to constantly ask ourselves. The temptation to quit or slow down is always before us due to bitterness. Recommit yourselves to keep fighting against the things that would so easily best you. It seems like it is not a once-for-all-time recommitment. Sometimes you have to go through this evaluation process many times because aging can make cowards out of us. If you want a great victory you have to still fight for the Lord daily. It's your choice to fight or die. Which will you do?
Shammah stood alone against the Philistines while the rest of the Israelites ran away. God gave him a great victory because he was fighting for a good cause.
This past Wednesday night my brother gave a terrific message about fighting for what is good and not backing down because of bitterness. In other words, don't becoming weary in well doing. No quitting allowed because of bitterness. My heart was stirred. I once read a quote that went something like this, "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."
We need to keep fighting for good against the things that make us spiritually weak and bitterness tops that category. How can I be blessed if I let bitterness control my life? The person or persons that cause this spirit have long forgotten it, but you have allowed yourself to become a prisoner of it. Bitterness is worse than any other emotion because it does you more harm than good and keeps blessing from flowing in your life.
You and I have to evaluate our lives daily and ask ourselves, "Are we still fighting for the things God has called us too?" It's a good question to constantly ask ourselves. The temptation to quit or slow down is always before us due to bitterness. Recommit yourselves to keep fighting against the things that would so easily best you. It seems like it is not a once-for-all-time recommitment. Sometimes you have to go through this evaluation process many times because aging can make cowards out of us. If you want a great victory you have to still fight for the Lord daily. It's your choice to fight or die. Which will you do?
The Backside Of Nowhere
Colossians 3:15 "And always be thankful.”
When I was a young Christian, I naively thought temptations such as being cynical or having a critical attitude would lessen with age. I thought I would be a nicer person when I reached the age of a senior. However, to my dismay, I find my mind is still being attacked by those same temptations due to horrible experiences I've endured in my senior years. The fact is we never stop dealing with our sinful nature, even though the Holy Spirit has given us a spiritual nature. I always said I wanted to be sweet and not sour when I got older, but I catch myself fighting those spirits more the older I get.
I've found that I need to be in continuous, moment-by-moment fellowship with God so I can remember to give my temptations to Him. When temptations come knocking at your door, you have to learn to let Jesus answer. He has given you the power to overcome the temptations of life if you allow Him to be in control. He's endured them all and overcome and can assist you as well throughout the course of your life.
Cynicism is one of the worst temptations that plague us today. It seems to be getting worse as we get older. Perhaps because of our past experiences we may very well be correct in our insights and analysis, but if our hearts are without love, it is sin. As a pastor I dealt with this spirit in others almost everyday. I used to be an eternal optimist doing what the Bible says and looking for something good in every situation. Yet I now realize that dealing with cynics and constant criticism put my mind in such a state I almost became a total pessimist.
I found the only cure for cynicism was to cultivate a habit of thankfulness. A thankful heart cannot be cynical.
If you find yourself being cynical or critical today, begin thanking God for all the blessings in your life. You will much happier. Since I have done this one thing, my optimistic outlook is returning, as well as my trust in people. Trust me, it's not fun living on the backside of nowhere. Let thankfulness prevail and your life will change!
When I was a young Christian, I naively thought temptations such as being cynical or having a critical attitude would lessen with age. I thought I would be a nicer person when I reached the age of a senior. However, to my dismay, I find my mind is still being attacked by those same temptations due to horrible experiences I've endured in my senior years. The fact is we never stop dealing with our sinful nature, even though the Holy Spirit has given us a spiritual nature. I always said I wanted to be sweet and not sour when I got older, but I catch myself fighting those spirits more the older I get.
I've found that I need to be in continuous, moment-by-moment fellowship with God so I can remember to give my temptations to Him. When temptations come knocking at your door, you have to learn to let Jesus answer. He has given you the power to overcome the temptations of life if you allow Him to be in control. He's endured them all and overcome and can assist you as well throughout the course of your life.
Cynicism is one of the worst temptations that plague us today. It seems to be getting worse as we get older. Perhaps because of our past experiences we may very well be correct in our insights and analysis, but if our hearts are without love, it is sin. As a pastor I dealt with this spirit in others almost everyday. I used to be an eternal optimist doing what the Bible says and looking for something good in every situation. Yet I now realize that dealing with cynics and constant criticism put my mind in such a state I almost became a total pessimist.
I found the only cure for cynicism was to cultivate a habit of thankfulness. A thankful heart cannot be cynical.
If you find yourself being cynical or critical today, begin thanking God for all the blessings in your life. You will much happier. Since I have done this one thing, my optimistic outlook is returning, as well as my trust in people. Trust me, it's not fun living on the backside of nowhere. Let thankfulness prevail and your life will change!
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