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Showing posts from October, 2014
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Nothing you do is private. You and I have a very public and social audience. Every question we've Googled, every Facebook post clicked, is somewhere and stored on a hard drive or in the cloud.  Spiritually, and more importantly, Heaven is watching our actions too. You probably realize that God knows everything. The Bible says: "...(The) Lord, (has) examined me ...(He)  knows when I sit down and when I get up... my thoughts before I think them... where I go and where I lie down... everything I do... even before I say a word, (He)  already knows it..." The Lord doesn’t miss a thing. Be amazed - God knows everything.  When I think about this I feel excited and little embarrassed, too. Does the fact that God knows everything about you make you uncomfortable? It could, because it means He knows all about your failings, shortcomings and your secrets. But it also should give you great comfort, because it means He cares about you and is concerned about what happens to you.
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Most of us have never had to face death or real persecution for our commitment to Jesus Christ - but that doesn’t mean the pressure is off. The secular culture in which we live has other ways of pushing and nagging at us while trying to thwart our obedience to the Lord. The story of Daniel and his three buddies in the fiery furnace ranks among the top ten best know Bible stories. This narrative is so familiar that we sometimes overlook what really happened - we can all too easily miss the story’s more subtle points & relevance to us. Wednesday Bible Study, 6:30 dinner with study time from 7-8pm
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As a kid I remembering helping my dad dig the foundation for his new garage on Division Street. It was hard work! The foundation and the material being used tell you how big and strong the structure will be. You can’t put a big garage on a small or faulty foundation. It’ll collapse every time. Fifty plus years later that garage still stands today. The same is true for our lives. You can’t become what God wants you to be on a faulty, poorly designed foundation. In our lives, we're given a lot of different options for what the materials of our foundation of life will be: experience, family, society & education to name a few. What if we use God's Word as the primary construction material in building life's foundation?  One of the key verses of the Book of Joshua is 1:8 “Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it.” The Old Testament is chock-full of stories of how the
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Imagine you saw God ... today ... right now. No church, no temple, no pastor priest or rabbi with you, just the incarnate living God standing before you, right where you sit, reading FB. Would you respond to God as Isaiah did? “Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.” Isaiah 6:5 How do you think you would react? I find this amazing. I listen to people talk about God so matter of fact, so flippantly - with such arrogance. Solomon wrote in Proverbs: “…The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge…” I think many people need an Aha Moment with God. Stop being religious for a minute and ask yourself, do I fear, not respect, but fear God? Are my lips unclean? If the answer is no, or I hope so, I pray that as you read this post you will feel a conviction, a realization, that God expects more from you … and has more to give you. I wish I could go on. Suffice to sa
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Life Lesson Studies  from the Book of Daniel Have you ever played with a Magic 8 Ball or Ouija Board? Ever visited a psychic or had your fortune told. Do you glance at the horoscopes in the paper or on-line, just for fun?  Daniel lived in country where government leaders looked to astrologers and psychics, magicians and wizards for answers and directions. In the second chapter of the Book of Daniel we will see a bold young man of courage stand up to the king and make a startling announcement, while giving credit to God. #ministryinmotionusa