Category Archives: Encouragement

“Ya Da!”

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Today’s media is on a reporting frenzy. Every time there is a good deed done, they make a magnificent banner and announce it to the whole world. The people say they are inspired. And more good deeds are sought. Now a celebrity circus comes to town. Who will be next to be bathed in the spotlight of “Good”?

Take a note of this: did anyone hear a trumpet blast from heaven as the leaves sprouted on the trees of winter? On the birth of every child, does anyone hear angels sing a magnificent chorus from heaven? Is any good deed from God heralded like a man heralds his own good deeds?


Yet God alone is purely good, continuous, eternally, majestically. Does anyone see a difference here? Or is it just me?


When we are done doing what good we do, let everyman say, “I have only done what I should”. If you will be like Jesus, reject accolades.

1“Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.


2“So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 3But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, 4so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”

The Orientation of “Valuable”

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365 days in a year. 365 years. I haven’t even quite made it to 65 yet. But Enoch, the seventh from Adam, lived 365 years before he walked with God and was seen no more for God took him.  

Can you close your eyes and imagine living 365 years in this place?  


Without God, I know for a fact I would despise my life in short order. But with the Lord to comfort me, guide me, teach me, and make me useful, it doesn’t matter how long I live where.  


Let us rethink “valuable”.

Being a Christian

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This morning I see this:Darkness on the earth is witness to a hushed murmur of violence. The night is a cloak for the thieves.  


They steal what they will; property, life and peace.  


But this I perceived:

The world spins around causing the Sun to rise. And the noise of wickedness is no longer a murmur.  


Now it is a deafening roar of greedy desire and wicked intent.  


Their eyes open shooting fiery knives of blame. Dreams and nightmares give way to the reality of judgmental hearts.  


The peace of the wee hours of the morning.  


The time of prayer, time of reflection. The time to receive life from He who is Life. Clarity comes from Him. And in the clarity I can perceive as if indeed from some vast distance. The place where the splatter of blood cannot reach.  


The night will come again. The thieves will sleep, the thieves will tiptoe about. But He who lives forever is Peace.  


By the command of the Living God, His name is Jesus! Quiet your soul and trust Him. Listen intently for what cannot be heard. Search for what IS. His desire is for you. Doesn’t the blood beneath the cross prove His intent?


He is not a thief, unlike we who pray. He comes to grant life, wisdom, forgiveness, peace, joy, faithfulness, and doesn’t the list become endless? Those who learn to receive become like He. The spinning of the earth becomes far less fearsome.  


This, is to be a Christian.  

The Currency of Man’s Traditions

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Will you enter into heaven by virtue of your own religion?  Will you set your own standard of righteousness and accomplish it, saying to the Holy guard of heaven, “I am a righteous man let me enter”?

Have you been to heaven?  Have you seen the surpassing glory of the creatures there?   Have you understood the nature of their holiness?  Have you understood the Holy commands they have received?

Will you now, you who are so feeble of mind, hold to the traditions of your own?  Or will you seek the unmovable, Holy and pure traditions of eternity?

You cannot spend the currency of Man’s traditions in the store house of God.  In that place, by your own strength, you can be no more than a beggar.  

“Doings”

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People can do an apparently endless volume of things. Yet, by the command of the Lord God Almighty, the things they do amount to “nothing”.

“Without ME you can do nothing.”


What then is the value of human achievement?

The Other Side

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The façade is quite complete. The wall erected between heaven and earth is unmovable by man.  

People stare at the wall. They imagine all kinds of things on the other side. And how quick they are to believe in their own imagination. “My mind can see it.   It must be true!”


Even scientific medicine promotes more imagination. “We can stave off death. We can bring many back from the brink of death.” They proudly say, “We are saving lives”. Still, the wall arrives, and their proclamation falls empty on the ground.  Having spent a fortune, the people still bury their dead. 


Consumed with the trivial and temporary things, people waste the moments of their life without the slightest care. They entertain themselves with an insatiable lust for more. Still, the wall looms like a shadow over Man.  


All the while, the Bible lay closed. An earnest searching for the will of God is pushed aside. The populace prefers their own imagination. Religions of man abound. Science-fiction appears to be more believable than the words of the Living God. The unmovable wall takes no notice.  


Here is today. It is filled with the things that ARE. Imagination is like a boy filled with fear; eyes wide, screaming at the top of his lungs, and arms flailing about. He will not listen to the calm voice of his parents. Lacking wisdom, woven tightly in his fear, his ears are firmly shut.  


Is there a better day to read the words of God and believe what you read? Is there a better day to pray for clarity? Will there be a better day to ask God for sanity?