I am blessed because,
For one, I am not addicted to alcohol, like Mel Gibson, although there was a time in my life when I was sent to an alcohol rehab because of my excessive drinking. I hope that Mr. Gibson will surrender his life to Christ and get some help for his addiction.
I am blessed today because Jesus Christ gave me the "exousian" which is Greek for "power" to become a child of God. He did this because I have believed in His name. So what?
Well, this among other things, gives me a right perspective on life. Sadly, I read recently about a person who lost this.
His name was Charles Brady and he was a retired NASA astronaut. Capt. Brady lived what the world would call an amazing life - he was a doctor, a pilot with the Blue Angels, a test pilot and an astronaut with hundreds of hours of space flight time. Yet, two weeks ago, Capt. Brady took his own life.
What went wrong? Well, sadly, thousands of people do this every day in our country and much of it is linked to depression by the media. I am going to say something here which, if anyone else read this would be misconstrued, but despression isn't the root cause of suicide. Sin is.
Every human being who has ever lived on this planet is full of sin. But not every person commits suicide. Why not? Well, sometimes, sin's effect is that it warps our bodies and causes defects which we cannot control without the supernatural power of God. Sin, makes a brain designed by God for goodness, love, joy and mercy to develop powerful thoughts of rage, anger, jealousy, murder and fear, sometimes through the complex image and signalling system of the mind and sometimes under the influence of chemical reactions.
Sometime's sin's effect is to weaken our faith and open the door for demonic influence - "voices" as it were which encourage us to do harmful things. For the unbeliever, these forces cannot be countered - no human has the power to overcome the devil.
For a believer, the wondrous news is that the devil has already been overcome - by Jesus Christ. His sentence has been passed - eternal punishment, but it has been delayed until an appointed time, which I happen to think is rapidly approaching, based upon Matthew 25.
Capt. Brady was overcome by sin. We all are at times, yet this time, he could not counteract its effect and it took his life. This doesn't make him any more of a "bad" person than anyone else. He isn't worse than I am, he was just overcome. I hope that he knew the Savior of the world personally before he died, which is the only thing that eternally matters.
I write this to remind us that the things which this world believes are important are eternally trivial. Imagine for a moment that you know you will live for 1,000 years. Will you really remember what you did when you were 30? I think not; this would be analagous to my remembering what I did when I was 6 minutes old; I simply cannot recall.
Now imagine that at 1,000 years of age you will not even have begun to live a new life of eternal joy and praise to God. This is exciting: think about how wise you might be had you been born in the year 965 instead of 1965. Emperor Peter I ruled Rome and europe was preparing to enter into a darkness known as the Middle Ages. You would have lived through the battle of Hastings in 1066, and seen the end of the Roman Empire. You would have lived through the rise of the French Empire under Napoleon, the Feudal wars of Japan and Russia, and the emergence of the Tsars. You would have seen the growth of Spain as it conquered the "New World" and you would have seen the rise of the British Empire upon which it was said, the "sun never set".
You would have seen the development of a new nation called "America" and watched as it defeated the great world power - England. Then you would have watched as it plunged itself into bloody civil war, killing more than 600,000 of its best and brightest young men. You would have seen as this new nation grew, and developed and lived through the great Industrial Revolution. You might have met George Washington Carver, Thomas Edison, Nicola Tesla or Michael Faraday. You would have watched as the nations of the world gathered to end the capture of europe by Germany - twice in the same century. You would have seen the towering mushroom clouds of destruction as they loomed over Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
You would have seen America dive into wars in Vietnam and Korea. You would have seen tremendous political upheaval and the launching of an all-out war against unborn babies. You would have watched as communism collapsed in the Soviet Union and as China began to open to the west.
If you had experienced all of this, would your like be consumed by the trivialities of daily life, or would your focus be less time-centered and more event or purpose centered? I think the latter.
The crux of the matter is that we all will live for eternity. Some will live in a paradise created by God for those who obey His command to believe in His Son, Jesus Christ as their salvation. Those who refuse to do this, will have chosen to spend eternity without God. There is only one place which fits this description, and we call it hell. It somehow is filled with flame, and brings about unending torture through the revelation of a persons true selfishness - without end, or conscience. Imagine yourself at your worst moment, in a fit of rage, passion or lust, what you might be capable of. Now imagine living in this state forever, with no hope of reprieve - coupled with a gnawing pain which will not go away.
I hate talking about hell, but I do it because Jesus spent alot of time talking about it. Hell, you know wasn't created for humans - it was made for a fallen angel named satan. But those who choose to follow him, by denying Jesus Christ, will follow him into his eternal punishment, which is what he wants most of all - misery really does love company.
Put aside Hell forever. Wash away your anxiety that you will be faced with this future. Do this by trusting in the Son of God, Jesus Christ to save you from this fate. All you have to do is ask.
Saturday, July 29, 2006
Sunday, July 23, 2006
How God blessed me today - July 23, 2006
God blessed me today because:
I have 3 healthy children. I don't take this for granted, but neither do I forget to thank my Father in heaven who gives them health.
My children all help my wife and I each month when we care for handicapped children so their parents can have a night out. This event is called "breakout" and is sponsored by Sugar Creek Baptist Church and is the brainchild of Ms. Barbara Waldhuber - a woman who loves children and the lord.
Because they work with children who suffer from Spina biffida, CP, autism, and many other undiagnosable illnesses, they understand how blessed they are and how blessed the other children are to be uniquely created in the manner in which they were made.
I am blessed because I have the honor and privilege of watching God guide my life. When I make foolish mistakes, He doesn't abandon or berate me - He gives me wisdom and sometimes correction, but most often hidden joy, so that I won't continue in my sin.
I am blessed because today in church, our children learned the parable of the talents in Matthew Chapter 25. This passage is very often misrepresented in churches today, because most expositors of this text think it focuses singularly on money. And, while the talent was a form of currency known to the first century hearers of Jesus' message, He wasn't speaking only about money and neither was He excluding it from the perview of His message. The bottom line is this: that God has given each of us gifts and talents and He expects us to use them for His glory - not ours. To use them for our own vainglory is blasphemy and greed of the highest order and will not go unpunished.
I remember an interview of the wife of some author, whose name I cannot remember. He apparently was the first American author to incorporate sex into mainstream literature and his racy novels were made into films which made him immensely rich. He would host parties on his yacht replete with cocaine and playboy bunnies.
When the interviewer asked his wife how she felt after his death, she said "I am the most miserable woman in the world." However, she was not speaking of the death of her husband as the occassion for her misery. She went on to explain how for decades, she sat by and watched as her husband paraded around the world with models and playmates, disregarding his wife and family. She felt as if she had spent her whole life for nothing. She also said that he had died miserably, in terrible pain and torment from a bout with cancer.
His cancer and her misery did not occur by mistake. When we use our gifts only for our own pleasure, that pleasure will last for a season. But eventually the season will end and tragedy will strike. This is not to say that tragedy doesn't strike those who are obedient to God - it often does. But such tragedy does not strike the faithful without purpose as it does those who are outside the will of God.
I would urge anyone who happens upon this blog to seek God earnestly and seek His blessings in your life. You can do this right where you are sitting. All you have to do is ask Him.
I have 3 healthy children. I don't take this for granted, but neither do I forget to thank my Father in heaven who gives them health.
My children all help my wife and I each month when we care for handicapped children so their parents can have a night out. This event is called "breakout" and is sponsored by Sugar Creek Baptist Church and is the brainchild of Ms. Barbara Waldhuber - a woman who loves children and the lord.
Because they work with children who suffer from Spina biffida, CP, autism, and many other undiagnosable illnesses, they understand how blessed they are and how blessed the other children are to be uniquely created in the manner in which they were made.
I am blessed because I have the honor and privilege of watching God guide my life. When I make foolish mistakes, He doesn't abandon or berate me - He gives me wisdom and sometimes correction, but most often hidden joy, so that I won't continue in my sin.
I am blessed because today in church, our children learned the parable of the talents in Matthew Chapter 25. This passage is very often misrepresented in churches today, because most expositors of this text think it focuses singularly on money. And, while the talent was a form of currency known to the first century hearers of Jesus' message, He wasn't speaking only about money and neither was He excluding it from the perview of His message. The bottom line is this: that God has given each of us gifts and talents and He expects us to use them for His glory - not ours. To use them for our own vainglory is blasphemy and greed of the highest order and will not go unpunished.
I remember an interview of the wife of some author, whose name I cannot remember. He apparently was the first American author to incorporate sex into mainstream literature and his racy novels were made into films which made him immensely rich. He would host parties on his yacht replete with cocaine and playboy bunnies.
When the interviewer asked his wife how she felt after his death, she said "I am the most miserable woman in the world." However, she was not speaking of the death of her husband as the occassion for her misery. She went on to explain how for decades, she sat by and watched as her husband paraded around the world with models and playmates, disregarding his wife and family. She felt as if she had spent her whole life for nothing. She also said that he had died miserably, in terrible pain and torment from a bout with cancer.
His cancer and her misery did not occur by mistake. When we use our gifts only for our own pleasure, that pleasure will last for a season. But eventually the season will end and tragedy will strike. This is not to say that tragedy doesn't strike those who are obedient to God - it often does. But such tragedy does not strike the faithful without purpose as it does those who are outside the will of God.
I would urge anyone who happens upon this blog to seek God earnestly and seek His blessings in your life. You can do this right where you are sitting. All you have to do is ask Him.
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