My Take

Often, I hear complaints about what is going on in the world today and in churches.  People have become disillusioned with society and even with church.  They are mad at their government, upset with society with its wicked pop-culture, critical of churches, and always blame someone else for whatever woes have come there way.  We blame politicians for their corruption, the government for deceiving us, the schools for brainwashing the children, the church for not being exciting enough or having enough ministries and the pastor for not being deep enough/hard enough/soft enough/or inspiring enough or whatever criticism we have.  Then everyone seems to have a “disease,” a trauma, or a disability, giving themselves an excuse for what they do or why they allow sin in their own life.   As bad as all these things are, they are going to continue. The world will still be wicked and hate God as the Bible says.  When the world speaks well of the church – woe to that church or preacher (Luke 6:26). 

We live in a generation that loves to interpret the Bible in a way that fits their lifestyle.  I have heard this a lot lately and even this week as I was talking to someone about the Lord when I was out running an errand.  They said: “I just think God has such a sense of humor and that Jesus is displaying his sense of humor throughout the Gospels.”  The notion being that Christ was a light hearted jovial Savior and wanted everyone to have a good time.  We often don't have a clear picture of who Christ was because we often only see what we want to see.   Even at Christmas time, we tend to place an overly glorious emphasis on it.  Certainly the angels proclaimed "Glory to God in the Highest," the shepherds came and worshipped that first night, and later - the wise men came from afar.  Other that those three instances the circumstances around the birth of Christ were at best mundane, often straining, and even terrifying.  Imagine, living in a day where you had to travel ridi

Living in a culture that is constantly worried about self-image and self promotion, we are all consciously or unconsciously working at making ourselves look better and even sound better. I think we all do want to be better versions of ourselves and make nominal or all out efforts to improve.   Many people (especially those who are trying to become famous or at least hope to score effortless income on the internet) are trying to make that image something even greater or tweak it to look or sound a little better. Often, in this effort, they are perceived in a way that is very unpopular in social media and then try to fix it. We have all heard of many being cancelled for saying what causes others to be upset. All but of few of these have come back and apologized for it with a statement such as: "The words that I used do not reflect who I am, what I believe, and what I stand for."    God says, NO - THAT IS NOT TRUE. YOU ARE LYING TO SAVE FACE AND FORTUNE! The product of your lips

Don’t back off what you know to be true. The Bible is real, it is God's Word to man. We need to hold to what it says with conviction. John the Baptist did. It landed him in prison - just that one statement – “It is not lawful for thee to have thy brother’s wife.” (Mark 6:18) But, he didn’t sway from it, he did not apologize for it! He stuck with the truth. A couple of men that I never personally followed but was also not against who years ago made a bold statement to America which I "AMENED" at the time: Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson both publicly stated boldly that 9/11 was a wake-up call to the American Christian; that it was the God’s lifting of his hand of protection and then a very short time later, both took back their comments.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMkBgA9_oQ4 https://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=126698&page=1 No, they were right, God did allow it - God certainly lifted His protective hand on our nation. Sure, it was a wicked act of lost hell bound

GOD USES THE BROKEN Psalm 31:9-12 9 Have mercy upon me, O LORD, for I am in trouble: mine eye is consumed with grief, yea, my soul and my belly. 10 For my life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing: my strength faileth because of mine iniquity, and my bones are consumed. 11 I was a reproach among all mine enemies, but especially among my neighbours, and a fear to mine acquaintance: they that did see me without fled from me. 12 I am forgotten as a dead man out of mind: I am like a broken vessel.* Have you ever felt like the Psalmist did in this passage?  Have you ever felt like you could not go on and that you were forever destined to failure especially concerning spiritual things.  Perhaps you have asked yourself: "Why would God want to use someone like me?  I don’t come from any good family line or a claim of fame; I have no riches; I offer no amazing things to this world; I live paycheck to paycheck, I am a sinner of the worst kind; I don’t keep my  word like I should a

Proverbs 24:11-12 says: If thou forbear   to deliver  them that are   drawn   unto death,   and  those that are   ready   to be slain ;  If thou sayest,   Behold, we knew   it not; doth not he that pondereth   the heart   consider  it ?  and he that keepeth   thy soul,   doth  not   he know  it ?  and shall  not   he render   to  every   man   according to his works ? I believe that the Lord set an example for us all when he said: Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.” Certainly, the teaching is multi-faceted. The primary teaching is concerning what Jesus Christ did for us on the cross of Calvary. Praise God for such a precious gift that brought about our forgiveness and redemption. But the second application is that we ought to be willing to lay down our lives for others. To be living sacrifices that they too might know, might see, might receive the Gospel that can change their live as well. But we live in a generation of forbearance in