Church - Where Did It Go?

Some of us are fortunate enough to be a part of a church body that is nourishing and traditional. How many of us are still searching for that perfect church?

I've told my children for years, and now I will tell you that church is in your shoes.We are not to look for comfort, we are to provide it.

When we first come to know the Lord, there are elders to lend a hand and help you to grow in the right way. Where will we be when those elders die off and we have not picked up the reigns?

Everywhere you search in the new testament you find nudges to grow up, not to remain babies. The truth is, you are the church.

Some of us yearn for the old days, for the congregation that was not afraid to openly worship. Where did those old days go? If you have memories of them, then it means they are in you. Try raising your hands and worshiping the Lord of Lords and you will instantly discover the old days.

Have we been taught to wait for the next evangelist to revive us? Are we told to hold on for the next tent meeting or revival to nourish us? No, we are taught to stir it up in ourselves.

It's our responsibility to 'stir it up', keep 'it' alive, keep oil in our lamps. We are to learn what it is to walk in the light, to obey our savior, to listen to His Words and to be the church.

Stop looking to others to feed your spirit and start looking to the Holy Spirit. He's quite capable and waiting. You can have church alone in your bedroom, alone in the garage, alone on a hill side. If you miss the joy of worship then stir it up and lead, not follow.

Remember always that church is you - church walks in your shoes where ever you go.

Want to Learn How to Be a Soldier of Christ?

Listen to Him. People don't listen to the Lord. They can read the gospels and never come out with the impact they should.

Jesus was no wimp. He taught His disciples as fast as He could, with the time He had to work with.

Note His reaction when the man brought his son to Jesus, because of fits, saying that His disciples tried to heal him with no results. Did Jesus immediately heal the boy? Not until He admonished His disciples and saying 'Vile of faithless generation' and 'how long shall I tarry with you'. That doesn't sound like much patience to me. It sounds like One who was running out of time and trying so hard, to get something across to them.

And what were His last Words on this earth? "Go ye therefore...." That, my friends, was a command from our leader and Master.

So how can you learn to follow Jesus, the way that He expected? Read the gospels and then read them again. When you are finished, start over and read it again and again and again until at last, your brain opens up and you see your Master for Who and what He truly is. You will know when it happens. Something changes inside you and you begin to view His teachings in a whole other light.

Then, you will begin to obey.

You've heard it said and it's written in the Word, "faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God". It's true. When you read the Word, read it again and again. As you read over and over, the Holy Spirit begins to move and when that happens, your faith builds. Try it. See if I'm not telling you true.

Let Go and Let God

One never knows where the next trial will come but come they must and do, and we have to be prepared.

Prepared? Yes, you can prepare. You've heard it over and over and you're about to hear it again. Gird yourself up with the armor of God. There's that and building faith.

Remember how to build faith? It's no joke, folks, that faith cometh by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.

Anybody ever give much thought to the way that's worded? "Hearing by the Word of God" doesn't exactly give you the idea that means reading the Word, although that's the way it's interpreted. It gives you the idea that it's all up to us, that reading is where the hearing happens but I see it in a whole other light.

Why 'and hearing, by the Word of God' ? It wasn't a mistake in terms and it wasn't terminology of the times, it really meant 'BY the Word of God'.

The Word of God is a living word. Hard to fathom but what I mean is that when you pick up the Word with every intent of loving it, listening and learning from it, the Word actually comes alive by the Holy Spirit and begins to feed you. It truly is a 2 way street. You're not alone.

'Faith cometh by hearing', in this instance it means listening, taking it in, allowing something outside yourself to come in and change you. And where does this 'hearing' come from? It comes from a living Spirit. You do the reading, of course but you don't have the understanding without the Holy Spirit. Therefore, as you read, the Holy Spirit speaks, so you are 'hearing'.

When your earthly father speaks, it confirms in you constantly, that he exists and is real. It's part of our make up to absorb from all senses, to know what is real around us.

When your heavenly Father speaks, it confirms in you constantly, that He exists and is real.

God lives in us through Jesus. God's Holy Spirit lives in God's Word, which is written down for us. That's not to say that that book is God's Word. That's to say that God's Word lives in that book.

So what it boils down to is this - gird yourself with God's armor and read...read...read....

Be there IN the Word, unite with the Holy Spirit OVER the Word and let faith build. You're not building faith, the Holy Spirit is through the Word.

Daily devotions are not devotions to the Lord, they are devotions to yourself, keeping the Spirit alive and refreshed daily - Ready.

By staying constantly filled up, you stay constantly in the light and thereby ready for every trial.

Not knowing where and how the next trial will come, it helps to have the Holy Spirit doing battle with you, all the way. The pain may be the same, the anger may feel just as strong but just as having a strong immune system helps you to come through sickness faster, being built up daily will carry you through the trial faster and easier.

Goliath was still Goliath and David was still David but the outcome was swift and victorious because of David's faith. God did not remove Goliath just so that David wouldn't have to face him.

God does not own this earth. He gave it to Satan but then He gave us the authority over it, and although Adam gave away that authority, Jesus bought it back and gave it back to man. So the fact is this earth is still what it always was before our time - Satan's world but we are victorious over him, in that we have the authority over him. So sickness and disease, heart ache and fury, will not go away. We simply have been given the tools to come through the trials with victory.

I have just come through one trial which has left me angry. As a result of seeing the end of that trial, I am thrown into yet another. The fact is, in my life, the trials have never stopped but I come through them, one by one and stronger than before.

You don't have to be the strong one, your strength is in the Lord. Forgive yourself for crying, you are the human, He is the God. You can cry because it hurts but that doesn't mean you've given in to defeat.

When anger wells up, realize what you're angry with-it just might be your own decisions you're angry over. If you've made a wrong decision it most likely means you weren't listening to the Lord. Although the damage is hurting you and not Jesus, ask Jesus to forgive the stumble and go on with life. There are more battles to be fought and won.

They Say God Speaks to Us

How many times have you tried to explain to folks, what it is you mean when you say 'God speaks'.

Here's a true story from some years ago. Actually, 1987.

I was going through an especially trying time. Ok, a confession, I was facing divorce. My body was still recovering after a still birth and the doctors had me on medication for high blood pressure.

I saw the writing on the wall, trouble was coming my way and there was nothing I could do to stop it. This divorce was necessary for the safety of both myself and my 14 year old daughter. The problem was, we were living out in the sticks, 15 miles from the nearest town and 20 miles from the city where jobs might be possible.

I wasn't up to this physically, and knowing I was left with an old car that may or may not make it through the next 100 miles and worn out tires, didn't do a thing to comfort me. Of course, I had been a housewife, not having a job and jobs were scarce where we happened to live.

I was worried and daily begging the Lord for answers. For about a week, a tune kept rolling through my head. It was so constant, it was driving me nuts but I couldn't seem to replace it with another tune.

I kept catching myself humming that tune outloud, while I washed dishes. It even rolled through my head while trying to watch TV. It was a constant, that wouldn't stop. Day after day, I woke up with that tune and carried it with me through the entire day.

I could not, for the life of me, remember what the song was. Numerous times, I stopped to dwell on it, hum it, go over and over the tune, trying to drag out a few lines to remind myself. It was such a familiar tune, I knew that I knew what it was and just couldn't pull it out.

Worries and daily grind took precedence so the problem of that tune got pushed back. I even hummed a few bars for my daughter but she too, couldn't think of what song it was.

I happened to be raising a large flock of chickens and was out early one morning, getting their feed and as usual, praying for answers to the problems and along came that song again, butting into my very thoughts.

This time, I began to hum the tune and suddenly burst out with the words, "Seek ye first, the kingdom of God...." Bam! there is was! The tune that had been driving me crazy, ever since I had started whining at the Lord about the coming stressful things and not knowing what to do.

As I was praying, the Lord was giving the answer but I wasn't listening. I finished with the feed and ran all the way back to the house, screaming at my daughter, "I've got it! I've got it!" Then I explained to my daughter about the tune and what it meant.

Don't you know my snotty little daughter had a come back, "Well, are you going to do it or just talk about it?"

Tell me, the Lord doesn't have a sense of humor or that He doesn't talk to us.

God Speaks: Stories For Teens

Marching head long into the final days

Anybody out there feeling the way I am? After waiting for a lifetime, to see the events unfold that have now come to fruition, I get excited to know the Lord's coming is so near.

At the same time, I'm furious. I don't know, living in America, for some reason I always had the feeling those things were going to happen 'over there'. It still just amazes me to know that our very own government is also pushing us toward that eventful day.

The new world order was something we tagged back in the 60's and waited to see how it would happen. Now, not only is it happening, everybody is using the same term we used so long ago, for what was coming in the future. It makes me mad. As an American citizen, of course it infuriates me to know that our leaders are selling us out. At the same time, I realize this is something foretold.

Now, in the name of geo-engineering, jets are dumping tons of poison on us, almost every day. That pretty much leaves me in a state of fury. How dare they? What's more, they hide behind closed doors and tried to keep it a big secret for so many years. I'm dumb founded at how many people have no idea what I'm talking about. I have to describe the sky of yesterday, to my grandson.

Then I look at it from a different point of view. We always wondered how people could be so gullible as to accept a mark in the right hand or forehead, in allegiance to some guy they are to worship. It's beginning to clear for me. We're already sick from all the poison from our sky. We're breathing aluminum and barium and just think, it's all over our food. We're eating it too.

Our immune systems are just about shot and now I'm hearing rumors that these materials could also be responsible for early onset of Alzheimer's. That would explain a lot of dumbing down. If people aren't thinking straight, how easy it will be to convince them of just about anything. When you spend years not feeling well, you're not thinking straight. So, yeah, this is going to be a snap.

I watch as our world turns upside down. It's ok to talk about and even teach the Muslim religion in our schools, but just think about carrying a Bible and you'll be shot down and loudly. Everything that was standard practice in the U.S. is now against the law. Yes, it makes me mad. At the same time, I'm looking up.

While all bad, for the Christian it's all good signs. So while we walk steadily through this valley of the shadow of death, look up. Our redemption draweth nigh.