The Joy of the Lord is My Strength

In the days of Ezra the walls of the city of Jerusalem were broken and Ezra asked the king, Artexerxes, to rebuild the walls of the city. When the walls were restored, Ezra gathered the people (Nehemiah 7:5) because the Lord put it on his heart to record them by their geneologies. While they were gathered there he read the book of the law to them. I love what it says in Nehemiah 8:8 :

They read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly, and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading. (ESV)

The words of the law were explained clearly so the people understood exactly what was being said...and it caused the people to weep, because they understood the words of the law and recognized their fallen condition. But Ezra told them not to weep because the joy of the Lord is our strength (Nehemian 8:10)

When we understand the Bible correctly, it causes us to see our sinfulness and it is not pleasant to see that ugly condition. There are many ways to react to this understanding....

The Message that We Preach

Each of us that has a blog is preaching a message whether we realize it or not. Is the message that we send out glorifying God and bringing honor to His name, or is it defiling it and casting doubt on His word and His goodness?

Unintentionally we all from time to time send out an errant message that detracts from what God says, I am just as guilty as anyone because none of us are perfect after all. The Bible does make clear, however, that there will be deceivers among us,

"God Doesn't Make Junk" Part 2

From Part One:

"In the post to follow I'll explore the contrasts the Bible gives of people that are headed for hell, and those whom the Lord restores by the power of His might, myself being one of the latter. He didn't have to save me, He could have let me continue to follow the piper happily dancing my way to a hell that I fully and truly deserve. However His grace stopped me from continuing on that path, and He provided me with the wisdom that had me put down my fleshy philosophizing, and all my worldly arrogance, and seek Him with my whole heart though at times I thought I would die from the horrid things I had to face about myself as His Spirit revealed what He had to clean up in me...."

Contrasts are quite revealing, and there are many in the Bible. Today I took a page of printer paper, folded it in half, and listed the traits

On Being Thankful

When I think of being thankful I honestly know that I am never, NEVER, thankful enough. I've seen bloggers have "thankful Thursdays", and there is nothing wrong with that, however it just serves to remind me how meager the thanks offerings we offer up are, and rarely do I see people talk about how thankful they are for being made new in Christ having the awful deep gross stain of sin removed. People often talk about

"God Doesn't Make Junk" Part One

This is a quote I've heard often...and it is true, yet and however, the Bible does tell us that the good that God created had a potential for becoming bad, and as we can see, it did.

The things of this world, including you and I, are decaying and dying. Yet God made a way to infuse us with His Spirit, but it is done under His conditions, and He causes the healthy changes, not our will...not our religion, not our goodness...His power, His will and done His way.

I've done quite a few posts on the topic of falling away on my other blog I wanted to have this blog to focus more on the Bible, mostly on refreshing and uplifting topics...

The "god" of This World

The devil is deceitful, everyone knows that, right? Well, maybe with the exception of outright satanists, who in a sense have it the most correct of the worldly religions. The satanists worship Lucifer, satan, as "god". Everyone who worships any other god  than the "God of the Bible" worships satan. This world's false religions include The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Jehovah's Witnesses, Buddhism, Mohammedism, Roman Catholicism, the Sikh religion, Shintoism, Seventh day Adventism, secularism, humanism, and even Judaism, just to name some of the more common ones, and ALL OF THESE worship satan, whether they know it, or believe it.....or not. The truth remains what it is no matter who wants to believe whatever they may want to believe. Their god that they worship (even if it is themselves that they worship---truthfully it usually is) well, this "god" is the god of this world, and he (satan) is powerless to save them. He (satan) can only keep them deceived and worshiping himself to their complete destruction and downfall. How do I know this? The Bible tells me this.

2Co 4:2  But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God's word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone's conscience in the sight of God.
2Co 4:3  And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled only to those who are perishing.
2Co 4:4  In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God.(ESV)

Street Preaching Part 8

Street preaching is tough, no doubt, and I applaud ANYONE who attempts to go out and "make a fool of themselves" for Christ, because this has to be one of the most thankless things you can do, especially these days.

However, I do think there are things, suggestions, that might be helpful in honing this activity and doing it so that it can have the most benefit. Of course first and foremost one should be scripturally sound in doctrine being presented.

This article lists some additional helpful suggestions if one feels led to preach on the streets:

http://www.reformation21.org/blog/2013/09/thoughts-on-street-preaching.php