How Much?


If you want to live forever, seek out Jesus the Christ of God.

If you want to serve Him faithfully, seek out Jesus the Christ of God.

What is the fullness that God is willing to give to man?  Seek out Jesus the Christ of God.  Only then can you begin to know.

If you think you “have”, seek out Jesus the Christ of God.

By His Grace

Hypocritical Honor


If I speak to receive the praise of men, can those words be words of God?  Yet if I am to speak words of any value, they must belong to the One who is eternally valuable.

I have seen how men praise one another for gallant and faithful action.  As if what is good can be borne among men.  If I join them in this praise where is my allegiance?  For anything that is truly good is born and borne of God.

Let the world praise their heroes.  I will honor, with worship, God’s hero: Jesus The Christ.

I say the following, knowing there will be misunderstanding: ‘I have come to despise the honor of men”. 

Men honor the ones who do good to and for them.  As a man may lay down his life (to whatever portion) for his fellow brother, he is honored. 

All the while, it is easy for them to despise the One who made them.  The One who truly loves them.  The One whom they have murdered.  The One who is shunned among them, even to this day.

Such honor of man is important among men, but only if it teaches us to treat The Living God with severe honor.  But this is not the definition used by men.

Men are paid to do what is good.  They are paid with money or fame; a type of immortality is placed on the mantle.  By this, men purchase honor.  Is it then truly honor?  Or does man hold one another hostage for the sake of reward?

But there is one who came, that he may do the will of the One who is forever Good.  Laying aside all possible human reward, he gave of himself without quarter.  What honor of man can compare?  Yet what distinct lack of honor men give him.

Every man knows this!  It is willing ignorance which keeps it hidden.  Willfully they are led to the pageantry of honor for those who are less than He.

They gladly stand at parades and wave their national flag.  Even a tear or two may be seen.  But mention the Living God’s Christ in a crowd of men and you will see them quietly disperse.  So man’s definition of Honor is defined.

This will not change until the Holy One is revealed.  But I am allowed to despise this hypocrisy of man.

By His Grace

The Shill of Man’s Joy


He was born in obscurity.  He readied himself with quiet humility.  He taught with words few understood.  He was condemned in private.  He was beaten in seclusion.  Then he was murdered in public.

The greatest of his joys is talked about the least; the moment when his feet left the ground.  At the end of his perfect ministry to man, he was taken up to be with his Father forever.

In this season, we talk about the baby.  In this season, we talk about his humiliation.  Though people marvel at the child.

But let us inject His glory to the story of our Lord.  For that tiny obscure child will return with explosive Holiness.

The world loves the innocent and helpless child.  But they have no regard for the glorious Lord he became.

The baby speaks no words of condemnation.  He is innocent and beautiful in their eyes. 

But make no mistake, at that time in his ministry, he was so treated by those who lived in his day.  Those same people who passed by with a smile, also screamed out the words, “Crucify him”. 

Christmas leads to three bloody nails.  Do not let the joy of the world confuse you.  They do not love The Christ, they love pageantry.

By His Grace

The Beast at My Door


Humility is a fleeting beauty

For the sake of the beast within.

She comes to kiss with eternal lips.

And thus, for a moment,

The beast is subdued.

But soon he finds a bobble,

That others do not have;

A rock, a leaf, a twig, or sand,

And he rises once again.
                      ~
Sin of pride crouches,

At the threshold of our door.

He desires to have us,

That he may have “what’s more”.

This horrible, putrid way of man;

This pride of life says, “Yes I can,

Be more than my brothers or sisters can be”!

To be equal with satan’s sin, you see.

The Apostle Paul had mentioned with three,

Prayerful attempts to be rid of thee.

But God in His Wisdom knows His design:

“My Grace is sufficient,

Humility’s mine”.

It’s given to man to endure and subdue,

That hideous beast that is me, that is you.

The deadliest animal ever to live,

Can be muzzled and chained

By the Glory that’s His.

By His Grace

To What End?


I can play the guitar and sing songs that praise God.  But to what end?  With the simple flick of a switch, men can listen to much better quality of music than I can produce.

The simple days are gone.  The days when a man might sit near the fire and entertain his loved ones with the music he can make, are gone.  They won’t come back in my life time.  If, indeed, they ever come back among men.

I could stand on a street corner and preach the word of God, in what variety of means might come to my heart.  But to what end?  Shall the steel of the passing cars hear my words and repent?  Not many read lips.  And their passing is far too quick to gain more than a simple word, as they speed by.

The simple days of inclusion are gone.  Now is the day of isolation.  And just think what this isolation is breeding.  Those in control of mass media hold the attention of the general public.  Gone is the day when a man might affect the passing public with the Gospel.  It’s gone.  And it’s not likely to return in my life time.

I could sing.  I could preach.  I could dance for them.  But to what end?

And I can write (as some might call these works).  But to what end?  Every article I post, stands in direct competition with a million others.  Every post I post falls into the pile of “interesting things”.

But there is something I can do that is viable.  There is something I can do that never fails to produce.  I can worship the Living God in Christ Jesus.

These simple things will never fade, not in this life or the life to come.

God alone knows the slices between men that penetrate to understanding.  He alone can penetrate the steel of a car.  He alone can whisper over the loudest stereo, and be clearly heard.  He alone can dance before them with entrancing creation.  He alone can write on our hearts!  He alone knows how to obliterate the noise of man.  He alone can drive a man to his knees in convulsive sobbing at the wickedness of the man’s heart.  And when He appears, then comes Life!

Prayer, direction of the will, that certain “listening” to what is, and obedience to what I know is holy,  these things I can do.  And they will never fail to produce that bounty that God deserves to have for the Life He has promised and delivered to those who love Him.

 

Amazing Thanks!


Let the family stand on a warm July night.
Let them coo and moan at those “special lights”.

Let the young man dress enticingly.
Let him snap his neck to see,
The beautiful girl who passes by;
Yet fades away to nothing.

Let the rich man yearn for gold.
Let the fool demand his drink.
Let the young man chase what cannot be.
I have joy I cannot speak.

For in this life I’ve come to know,
The God who made my very soul.
This wonderful, fearful sack I own;
This knit together bag of bones,
Contains the promise of his throne:
“I will yet His face”!

They pine away for what passes away.
Completely content, this place to stay.
But now I lean into the Wind,
“Lead me home, my Holy Friend”.

In This Life–Collin Raye with lyrics: http://youtu.be/pOKqidAsRTs

By His Grace