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June 15, 2021

“Then You Will Know That ‘I AM’ “

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28 So Jesus told them, “When you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I AM, – John 8:28a ISV


John 8:12-30 ISV


The Pharisees and the ruling class were still trying to find a way to be rid of Jesus.  They were always trying to catch Jesus in some error or saying something that they could define as blasphemy.  This would allow them to take Him to the Romans and ask for the death penalty.  As Jesus taught the people,  His words had again infuriated the Jewish leaders with His claim about who He was.  In this passage, He not only tells them who He is, He also prophesies that He will die by being hung on a cross.  He also refers to Himself as “I  AM” in this translation.  The same way God had always referred to Himself in the Old Testament.  God and Jesus both referred to themselves in the present tense, never in the past and never in the future.  We say God was, God is and God will always be. They just say “I AM”.   They live in and refer to life in the present or the “now”.   We should follow their example and live our lives the same way.  As Mother Teresa once said:  “Yesterday is gone. Tomorrow has not yet come. We have only today. Let us begin.”   Though Jesus knew that He would die on a cross in a few days, He did not let that deter Him from doing what our Father had sent Him to do.  We should not let regrets from yesterdays or worries and fears about tomorrow deter us from accomplishing God’s purpose and plan for us today.

“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” – Anonymous

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May 4, 2020

“I Know My Sheep”

14 “I am the good shepherd; I know my own sheep, and they know me, – John 10:14 NLT

The Good Shepherd

A good shepherd will not allow any of his sheep to be harmed. Someone who is paid to keep sheep or is just tending the flock for his own benefit might run from the dangers and leave the sheep alone. David was an example of a good shepherd, he fought the bear and the lion and literally took the sheep from their mouth.

34 But David said to Saul, “I, your servant, have been keeping my father’s sheep. When a lion or bear came and took a sheep from the flock, 35 I would chase it. I would attack it and save the sheep from its mouth. When it attacked me, I caught it by its fur and hit it and killed it. –1 Samuel 17:34-3​5​ (NCV)

Jesus is a better shepherd than David. He loved us so much that He gave up His glory in heaven to come to earth so that we could be redeemed. He became human and dwelt among us. He came so that we would know His voice and choose to follow Him. He died to redeem and reconcile us to God. He is still in the reconciliation business. He fights every battle for us and yes, He even pulls some of us from the mouth of hell. Jesus hates the sin but loves the sinner. He expects us to have that same attitude. There are those God has put in our paths that He has chosen for us to shepherd. Be a good shepherd and love them into the fold just as Jesus did for us.

22 Show mercy to some people who have doubts. 23 Take others out of the fire, and save them. Show mercy mixed with fear to others, hating even their clothes which are dirty from sin—Jude 22 (NCV)

“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

February 8, 2020

“This Is How We Know”

2 This is how we know if they have the Spirit of God: If a person claiming to be a prophet acknowledges that Jesus Christ came in a real body, that person has the Spirit of God. – 1 John 4:2 NLT

1 John 4:1-3 NLT

As we all know not everyone that speaks to us has the Spirit of God abiding in them. There are those sent from satan who masquerade as “angels of light” but are actually false prophets.

13 These people are false apostles. They are deceitful workers who disguise themselves as apostles of Christ. 14 But I am not surprised! Even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. 15 So it is no wonder that his servants also disguise themselves as servants of righteousness. In the end they will get the punishment their wicked deeds deserve.–2 Cor. 11:13-15 (NLT)

We must always test the spirit and see if it acknowledges the Lordship of Jesus Christ. The devil knows that God exists and he knows the Scriptures better than we do. The Spirit that dwells in us will witness to us if a person has a kindred Spirit to ours. But if you are in doubt, you can always ask if they believe that Jesus shed His blood on Calvary for our sins. If they acknowledge that this is true and they acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus, then we have assurance that it is not a false spirit.

3 So I want you to know that no one speaking by the Spirit of God will curse Jesus, and no one can say Jesus is Lord, except by the Holy Spirit.—1 Cor. 12:3 (NLT)

“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

02-08-2020

June 1, 2019

“Great and Mighty Things”

15 “I know all the things you do, that you are neither hot nor cold. I wish that you were one or the other!  –Revelation 3:15 NLT 

Revelation 3:15-19 NLT

God wants each of us to be totally committed to Him. Our lifestyles should reflect that commitment.  We have to look inside ourselves and allow God’s Holy Spirit to show us where the problem lies.  What is keeping us from being totally committed to Jesus?  Are temporary physical pleasures more important than eternal life in heaven?  Eternal life with Jesus is a free gift, so earning more money is not going to get you there.  The only true peace and contentment we have is in Jesus.  He knows our hearts and He knows the solution to not only the sins we try to hide, but to any situation we are facing. He is waiting to share that information with You.

Stop!  Listen!

If you do, He will speak to You.

3 ‘Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.’   — Jeremiah 33:3 NKJV

The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” – Anonymous

Post 06-01-2019

May 29, 2019

“I Want to Know Christ”

10 I want to know Christ and experience the mighty power that raised him from the dead. I want to suffer with him, sharing in his death — Phil 3:10 NLT
Phil. 3:7-11 NLT

Can you imagine the power that was manifested when Jesus was resurrected from the grave? There must have been tremendous spiritual warfare occurring around that location and that time in history.  We have that same power available to us to use for God’s glory today. Our mortal bodies are rotting away, but our Spirits should be getting stronger each day as we allow God to renew them. Paul says the problems we have today are trivial and temporary compared to the glory they will produce. When we endure small problems here, they produce a greater glory that will last an eternity. So, each day we should be focusing on Jesus and looking forward to the things that we cannot see now, but God says when they are manifested in the future, they will last forever. So, when troubles seem many and satan is trying to defeat you at every turn, “Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in His wonderful face and the things of this world will grow strangely dim in the light of His glory and grace.”  We need to learn to walk in that glory and grace and experience that power.

“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” – Anonymous

Post 05-29-2019

February 24, 2018

“Search My Heart, O Lord”

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21 You cannot drink from the cup of the Lord and from the cup of demons, too. You cannot eat at the Lord’s Table and at the table of demons, too. – 1 Cor. 10:21 NLT
 
1 Cor. 10:16-22 NLT
​When we take the Communion, we are all symbolically partaking of the same body and the same blood. This has been true ever since Jesus set the example with the disciples in the Upper Room. No matter what time it is in eternity, we are all bound together by that one body and one blood and it will be culminated in heaven when we all partake of the Communion at the great banquet table. So, we should never defile that practice by partaking of anything that has been sacrificed to idols or to demons of any sort. We cannot serve two masters and our God is a jealous God. We do not want to provoke Him.
13 But you shall destroy their altars, break their sacred pillars, and cut down their wooden images 14 (for you shall worship no other god, for the Lord, whose name is Jealous, is a jealous God), —Exodus 34:13, 14 NKJV
While we may not bow to wooden or golden images, we can still have things that we treasure more dearly than our relationship with God. These things or people are just as much an idol as any graven image. Each of us needs to ask the Holy Spirit to show us the things in our lives that grieve Him. Those things are our idols.

23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my anxieties; 24 And see if there is any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting–Psalm 139:23, 24 NKJV

“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 02-24-2018

September 8, 2017

“Taught By God”

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45 As it is written in the Scriptures,[b] ‘They will all be taught by God.’ Everyone who listens to the Father and learns from him comes to me.​ – John 6:45 NLT

​Drawn by the Spirit


Apparently, the old saying “seeing is believing” doesn’t always hold true, The people had seen the miracles Jesus had performed, but it still was not enough to convince them of the truth of Who He really was. They said,”We know His mother and father”, so how can a human claim to be the Son of God and that He came down from heaven? Jesus said “stop complaining….”. You can’t come to me unless you are drawn and you can’t know the truth unless you are taught by God. How can this be? How can we be taught by God? This is the work of the Holy Spirit, the third person of the Trinity. It is His job to “guide us into all truth”. We haven’t seen God and we can’t see the Holy Spirit, but we can know that He calls us and abides in us, if we accept that invitation to come to Jesus. Once we listen to the Holy Spirit (the Father) and learn from Him, we are children of the Living God. The gift of the Holy Spirit is the first installment that guarantees Jesus can and will keep us until He raises us up on the last day.

21 It is God who enables us, along with you, to stand firm for Christ. He has commissioned us, 22 and he has identified us as his own by placing the Holy Spirit in our hearts as the first installment that guarantees everything he has promised us.​—2 Cor. 1:21, 22 (NLT)​
6 And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.—Philippians 1:6 (NLT)


“The Gospel has come to you because it’s on its way to someone else.” -Anonymous

Post 09-08-2017

January 4, 2017

Meditating on God and His Word

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1 Blessed is the one    who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
    or sit in the company of mockers,
2 but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,   
and who meditates on his law day and night. — Psalm 1:1-2 NIV
 
Psalm 1 NIV

How do we show Jesus that we love Him? To love someone, it is necessary to get know that person, to get to know a person requires us to spend time with that person. When you love someone, you want to spend as much time as possible with them. How much time do you spend with Jesus each day? He has written a book full of love letters to us, have you read them? When we love someone, we think about them most of the time. How much time do you spend meditating and thinking about Jesus? If we examine our lifestyles and find out where our heart is, what treasures would we find? Don’t hang onto temporary, worldly “treasures”, fix your thoughts on eternity and Jesus. Nothing can separate us from God’s love and those treasures we lay up in heaven.

Post 01-03-2017
October 12, 2016

Change Is Good

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2 May God give you more and more grace and peace as you grow in your knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord. — 2 Peter 1:2 NLT

We have all heard the story many times of couples that live together for years. As time passes, they take on each other’s attitudes and characteristics.  They even get to the point that they can finish each other’s sentences.  As we spend time with our Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ, we do the same thing. We start to take on His characteristics of grace, godliness, affection, and His love for others.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful to be able to finish God’s sentences?  We will  never get to that point, but we can become more like Him every day, if we will just commit to spending time with Him and meditating on His Word.

After You have talked to Him, allow plenty of time for Him to talk to You. He has a lot to tell you and He has an unending stream of love that He wants to lavish on you.

Be still, wait on Him to speak, and really, really listen. When just knowing about Him isn’t enough and you get to the point of wanting to know HIM, your attitude toward others and your outlook on life will begin to change for the better.

As we spend more time with God, we are slowly being changed into His image.
Post 10-12-2016
September 25, 2016

I’m In Love!

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8 But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners. — Romans 5:8 NLT

The more I study the Scriptures, the more I am reminded of the great old hymn, “I Love to Tell the Story”. The passages of Scripture are unique and different, but they tell us more about the same story, the story of Jesus. It is a complete story of His complete love. It seems incomplete to us in the beginning, but the more we study, the more we realize it is all there, we just haven’t understood it yet.  I have “loved” Jesus a long time, but it is only in the last few years that I have come to realize that what I really wanted was to be “in love” with Jesus. I used to know about Him, but now I just want to know Him. The only way to really fall in love with someone is to get to know them and the only way to do that is to spend time with them, whether that be physically with them or to be with them in Spirit.  God’s Holy Spirit searches our hearts and knows the heart of God (since He is God) and He communicates between those hearts because He indwells us. What a wonderful plan! Because of God’s Holy Spirit, we can spend time with Him all the time.

Post 09-25-2016