“I will never …” Hebrews 13:5. Deut 31: 6

How would you like to be the first person in something? Adam was the first man on the face of the earth. He was created, September 21, 4,000 BC. ^{(Traditional)} Ferdinand Magellan and his crew were the first to sail around the world from 1519-1522.  John Hancock was the first person to sign the Declaration of Independence.  The first person who set foot on the continent of Antarctica is said to be the American John Davis, a sealer, who landed there on 7 February 1821.  The first man to reach the North Pole was an engineer in the American Navy called Robert Edwin Peary, who reached the pole on April 6, 1909 along with his employee Matthew Henson.  29^th May, 1953 the first
persons to climb Mount Everest to the summit were Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay (who reached the top together) is recognized as the first time the peak was conquered. 

Chuck Yeager was the first man to break the sound barrier on 14 October 1947 in the Bell X-1.  February 20, 1962, John Glenn was the first American to orbit the earth. Do you remember Neal Armstrong? He exited the space craft, sitting on the moon’s surface and climbed down the ladder, then turned and set his left boot on the surface of the moon at 2:56 UTC July 21, 1969, the first man to set foot on the moon.  What an accomplishment!

Each of these were accomplished and verified by others and cannot change.

The first to love you was God the Father.  “God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” ^{John 3:16} 

“But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” ^{Rom 5:8 NIV}  

Whatever crisis you are facing just now or will face shortly, remember that God has never failed ANYONE.  If he failed you, you would be the first!  Strengthen your faith because he “will never leave us nor forsake us!” And besides, He loves you too much to let you be the first!  And that cannot change!!

Just a Thought

John 14:6 Jesus said, “I am the truth. . .”NIV

One of the most amazing scriptures I could ever read is the one where Jesus says, “I am the truth.”  He does not say, “I tell the truth,” which He does, but he says, “He IS the Truth!”  The very whole of Himself, body, mind, soul, and strength is TRUTH!  No term is more familiar and none more difficult of definition.  Truth stands alone.  There is no shade in truth.  There is no qualifying in Truth.  There is no hinting in Truth.  There is no such thing as “nearly” truth.  It is absolute, irrevocable, and as sure as inertia and chemical valences. 

He can be said to be accurate.  He is absolutely correct.  He is absolutely faithful. He is absolutely honest.  He is absolute justice.  He is upright.  He is absolutely factual.  He is absolutely righteous. He is veracious.  He is to be credited on His own word, because He is the Truth, and therefore can neither lie nor deceive.

I believe that our own “reasoning” gets us in a lot of trouble.  We sometimes reason that Jesus’ teachings are, pick and choose.  We can pick and choose which of the scriptures is aimed at us, for us to obey.  When in fact all of His teachings are TRUTH and one time or another in our lives we must use His teachings to give equilibrium to our own spiritual lives.  There are many things that are “legal,” but they are not right, in TRUTH’S sight, such as abortion.  It is legal, but it is wrong.  Remember you may have “legal” grounds to do what you want, but you must always ask if it is “right” and consistent with TRUTH.

When we read, (Phil 4:19) “And my God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus,” ^NIV what goes through your mind.  If we are praying about a specific need or crisis, don’t we rationalize that He may be too busy to answer our prayer?  Do we think that He has not heard our prayer?  Do you say, “I am really nobody that God should answer?”  All of these are a slap in the face of Jesus.  HE IS TRUTH!!  He cannot lie and He will meet all the needs we have. Jesus sometimes meets our need in other ways than we expect.          I think he does this to keep us from thinking that He is working for us, rather than the other way around.  When we rely on “TRUTH,” we are never disappointed. Do you realize that God can’t learn?  He already knows everything.  Our prayer should be prayed with that in mind so that we don’t try to educate God on the issue at hand.  We should make our petition known to Him and leave it with Him, knowing that He will meet that need.  Didn’t He say He would? Why would we doubt?  Didn’t He tell us the TRUTH about the cross and resurrection, before it happened?  

Just a thought.

Mark 10:17-23

How does money rate in your life?  Is it very important, (thinking constantly of money or how to get money, or money problems, or how much we don’t have)? In our greedy society, we have game shows that give hundreds of dollars to millions of dollars to contestants that answer a puzzle or answer some trivial question.  We are sold the idea that having money will solve all our problems and it should be easy to get.  Then the question is how much will it take?

Some time ago a company that I worked for sent me on a business trip.  I was to keep receipts and then turn them in for reimbursement. This particular trip there was $1,000 in receipts turned in.  I handed them to the manager and left the office. The manager declared that he never received them.  At that time in my life we were not making even minimum wage.  $1,000 is a lot of money, not only then but now also.

I requested the payment several times before they told me that they couldn’t pay without the receipts.  They asked me if I had a duplicate copy of each receipt.  Of course, I didn’t and so therein lies the dilemma.

For several days that turned into weeks and then into a couple of months, I would wake in the night and the first thing that came to mind was that $1,000!  Throughout each day I would have that money on my mind.  I regret that I had the usual thoughts that anyone else would have, such as, a stick in their eye, go in and stomp on their foot, burn the building down, etc.  Of course I was not going to do that, but it seemed to take over my thought at any time.

Solution: After a couple of months of this torturing myself with these thoughts, I came to realize that my new Christian life was going nowhere.  No peace, no joy, just the constant thought of that $1,000.

One night I woke and prayed from the deep of my heart, “Lord, I give that $1,000 dollars to you.  You collect it if you want to.  As a matter of fact if they decide to send it to me I promise that I will send it back!  I don’t want it, it belongs to you to either forget it or collect it.  But, as for my part I don’t want anything to do with it. IT IS YOURS!!!!

I never missed another night’s sleep over it and it faded ever so peacefully out of my mind.

Several times in my life since, I have had to do the same thing in order to keep peace in my soul.  When my money was stolen, three other times, I gave it to God to collect so I could forget it and not have the storms in my heart.  I thank God for the lesson learned and applied.  A right relationship and peace with my Lord is all I need.

I’m so sorry that rich young man didn’t learn the lesson, I learned, that day with Jesus.  Instead he went away sorrowful.

Just a thought

Mark 6:38-52. 38 "How many loaves do you have?" NIV

It was a beautiful spring day, and the grass was green on that hillside.  The people had been asked to form ranks of fifties and hundreds.  (The word prasia: translated ranks, means a garden plot).  It must have looked a lot like a very large colorful garden with all the colors of the garments those people were wearing, the reds, blues, and yellows. 

John says it was a small boy that had the basket with 5 loaves and two fish in it. Jesus took it and blessed it and handed each disciple one basket with bread and fish in each. Each disciple took the basket handed him and began to distribute to the people and every time they reached in their basket they came up with bread and fish.  Each disciple reached in his basket more than 450 times and each time there was the same amount left in the basket.

The thing that amazes me is that there was no one commenting on the never ending supply of food.  The disciples did not shout hallelujah!  No one even said, “Praise God”!! The people most certainly watched the food coming their way and the same small basket seemed to always have the amount needed for each person.  The people waiting were wondering if there would be enough by the time it was their turn to receive a portion.  Once the disciples started doling out food they did not stop!  They just kept on going down the line one person after another.  Yet, silence!!!  HOW CAN THIS BE??

How often do we witness a miracle and don’t even recognize it as a miracle? How often does the Hand of God move in our lives and we don’t even see Him at work? How much do we miss because we are not looking for it? God still moves in the lives of His people but how often do His people even recognize what He is doing? The great miracle that was being performed right before their eyes as the 5,000 plus people were getting their fill, and they all missed it.

⁵²for they had not understood about the loaves; their hearts were hardened. ^NIV

I pray that we will not have hearts that are so hard we do not recognize our miracles as they happen, right before our eyes!

Just a thought.

He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High . . . Ps 91:1KJV

Where is the most secret place you know? My wife said it is her secret closet of prayer.  Where is your most secret place?  To me it is that space between my ears.  The Bible calls it “the Heart.” That place where only I have access. That place I can put things that no one will ever see or ever know unless I choose to make it known. That place in our brains that hold our very consciousness.  I don’t know of any place that is more secret than my innermost thoughts.  I can make plans for the future there.  I can work out problems there, if the problems are simple enough.  I can also reason out the puzzles in life that cloud my view.

Many of the problems that invade my secret place are the ones I have introduced, either by chance or on purpose.  Some are thoughts that I have taken into my secret place and hoped to solve without anyone helping. As I grow older I can see how foolish this is.  So, along the way I invited Jesus to come in and help me with my secret place. It has now become HIS secret place. I don’t have to tell Him my secrets because when I invited Him in he saw how I was.  He did not condemn but rather forgave the wrong and made a straight path to follow, with Him in the lead.

There are times when I have to renew my secret place and the upkeep is constant.  I read God’s word and mediate on it.  I listen to my favorite hymn music or I go to church or bible studies so that I can reinforce my secret place that I have given to Him.  Jesus never took my secret place by force he knocked on the door, one day, and I let Him in.  He sits on the throne of my secret place because I actively want Him to.  If I get too involved in too many things that take away from my fellowship with Him, I begin to feel insecure.  My judgment becomes clouded and my way seems unsure.  Doubt is not far behind!

He tells us to pray without ceasing and I know that He is not kidding because when our prayer life suffers the attention it deserves we suffer spiritually.

What’s in your secret place?

Just a thought

But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind…NIV Phil 3:13

After his small sailboat sank in the Atlantic, Steve Callahan spent 76 days in a five-foot inflatable raft, drifting 1800 miles before his rescue.

If you can imagine being in a small boat 1000 miles from any land, in any direction, and not even be in a shipping lane of any kind, adrift.  No hope of being rescued. I wonder at the helplessness of that feeling.

I wonder if we are not in just such a place with our sea of past memories. We seem not to be able to shake our past experiences. Our  disappointments, shortcomings and failures.  The sharks of mistakes, people we’ve hurt, wrong turns in our life directions, wrong decisions, misdeeds, are circling our boat continually.  The sea of past memory will devour all our life if we are not careful.

The right things to remember are those experiences that bring a smile to our face.  Our children, the people we love, the people who love us.  Especially, and specifically, the love God has shown us on many occasions. It is most profitable to rehearse the times God has intervened in our lives by answering our many prayers. How about times when God gave us blessing we didn’t ask for?

Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things. ^{Phil 4:88 KJV}

Paul would have been unable to function as an apostle of Jesus Christ if he had dwelled on his past.  He understood that and so should we.

Jesus is ready to rescue us from our sea of past failures.  He wants to bring us to the land of TRUTH so that we may walk the shores of good memories with HIM! Don’t forget, Jesus doesn’t live today in our past. His rescue ship is sailing by, right now! Are you ready to be rescued?

Just a thought.

Luke 4:24

Luke 4:24. "I tell you the truth," he continued, "no prophet is accepted in his hometown.” ^NIV

It has long been a mystery to me why there are times when I have the answer for some folk’s problems.  I can see the answer in scripture.  It is as plan as the nose on your face and that can be pretty plain.  Why is it that when there are such simple answers that people feel that the answer has to be much more complicated?

God’s answers are not complicated at all.  If I were to take all the answers to all the problems of our lives, there would not be any complex formula to the answers.  The simple answer is Jesus Christ.  He is the answer and it is so simple that many people stumble over it like it was a large log lying in the road.

However, the problem I see that is the most stunning and disheartening to me, is that we are of less help to our own family than to the rest of the world.  I would so like to help my family, especially the immediate family.  But, you know what?  Jesus had just the same problem when he began preaching. He said, "I tell you the truth," he continued, "no prophet is accepted in his hometown.” I might add “in my own house.” 

How many of us have children and grand-children and maybe even great-grand-children that are trying to find all the answers in friends, drugs, alcohol, or pleasure.  It seems that our words are of no value to their chosen lifestyle.  It breaks our hearts and leaves us very weak and perplexed as to just what to do.  I know all these feelings all too well.  But, I maintain that we must follow scripture when dealing with these issues.  The prodigal son was left alone until…HE… decided he had had enough of that kind of life.

People who have been into these kinds of things and then found Christ are many. I only hope we have enough grace to trust God to bring them to the end of themselves, soon.  Somehow God loves to work alone in these cases.  He doesn’t need our help.  I know that we are always on the ready to be of assistance but the genuine change can only come from Jesus Christ.  For only He can change the heart!

What I recommend is that we all pull up a chair beside Jesus and wait with Him!

Just a thought