Starting Here…

Do you ever look around you, really notice it all? All the places, things, people! Most of them are lost as a golf ball in high weeds you know and don’t even realize it. Many have never heard of God, Jesus and grace much less the gospel of the grace of God, others think they are saved because they go to the right church, did the right activities, participated in required ceremonies and rituals, prayed the right prayer, paid the right amount, etc. but they are just as lost as the other guy. They are all taking a fast train to hell and a lake of fire that’s gonna roll into the station at full speed. That’s the vast majority of people we encounter each day you know. What if we made it a point to tell just 1/4 of the people we encounter each day about Christ and what he didn’t them. What if we loved them as He does, loved them enough to ask hard questions, face awkward moments head on and preach the gospel of Christ’s death burial and resurrection to just one in four people we have contact with each day. I bet we change the whole world, at least for that one person who hears, who believes and becomes the newest member of the Body of Christ.

It doesn’t have to be hard you know. I worked at memorizing some key Scriptures that explain why we all need reconciled to God, how He made the way for that and what that way is. Then I spent a few minutes coming up with a general line to reach out to everyone I encounter. For me it’s this:

I ask everyone I talk to: telemarketers who call, cashier’s at the store, restraunt workers, passersby, doctors and their staff. It’s even my closing signature for my email and my voicemail message. That’s all it takes and sometimes they hear me, ask questions, want truth. Sometimes the person I ask directly doesn’t answer or brushes me off but the man in line behind me calls out to you with tear filled eyes thanking me because he needed to hear those words. He had heard it but was struggling, he’d fallen off that old wagon and was hurting and those words of live and life and hope gave him strength, reminded him he’s loved by the very Creator of the universe who died for him, for his sins, took his place and was saying believe in me and what I did for you, how much I love you and I will give you life in me. Because someone on Earth loves every person they encounter just a little fraction as much as Christ does then maybe the body will get one member stronger. That’s what Paul did and we all can too. We all encounter people each day in our lives, the world is lost and needs Christ, we have to share Him.

The Peace of God

Tonight we had to go to the city after my husband got home from work. As we were driving I was looking at the sunset and thinking about how it looked like God had hand painted it. I grabbed my phone and snapped a few pics as we drove through the hills. The pics don’t begin to do the sight I saw justice, the sky looked like a beautiful opal almost the colors so amazing.

When my son was studying geology last year we looked at how different rocks, minerals and gemstones we’re formed. Opals have always been my favorite stone just because of their iridescence and fiery beauty. But when I learned what makes them.so truly breathtaking I could only give praise to God for those milky, creamy white stones that are ugly, dirty, blemished, flawed on their own we’re just like I used to be before I was saved. But those impurities, imperfections, dirt and stains that are ugly on their own turn to brilliant shimmering fiery bursts of color in the radiant sea of shimmery pearlescence that defies description when the light shines into them. Just like when the Light of Christ shines in us and we go from filthy, broken, dirty,jacked up hot messes of sin and imperfections to beautifully flawless and perfect in Him. When we are in Christ and more importantly He is in us we are like opals – flawlessly breathtakingly beautiful because of the Light shining through our imperfections.

That’s what I was thinking taking the pictures and then when I saw this verse as I was about to study for a few I had to share it with you all. Because when we see who we are in Him and what He has done for us we know the peace of God for it resides in our hearts, we have so much to be thankful for as the Body. I pray that this peace will rule in our hearts and we will be thankful. As always my beloved brothers and sisters in Christ may you always know you are eternally gripped in His glorious grace.

Do You Know?

Learn It, Know It, Live It

Tonight I want to share a passage of Scripture I think is one of the most important ones we as members of the Body of Christ can learn. Now when I say learn I really do mean it, it would reward us greatly if we memorized this passage as it grounds and assures us if what Christ did for us, why and who we are in Him. It’s the first passage new believers ought to really commit to their hearts and one that any believer will cherish and treasure if they make it a point to memorize it. Yes, I said memorize scripture, it is what the Bible tells us to do:

Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee. Psalms 119:11 KJV

That is true in any age and Dispensation, a principle that bears adhering to today in the age of grace as much as when it was penned by David. It doesn’t take long to memorize God’s word, particularly if you use the KJV as it lends itself well to it. One if my favorite methods is to jot a verse down on a small paper or in a notepad and then repeat it a bunch using the 7’s trick. What’s that you ask; simply repeat a verse or passage 7 times in a row, 7 times a day for 7 days. Then you say it once a day for 7 days , then 7 weeks, 7 months. By the end of that first week it’s locked in short term memory and then the additional repetition locks it in long term. I add a new verse each week and start the process with it dropping older verses down accordingly. My son and I have memorized entire chapters using this method.

So what’s the passage that is so important I’d tell you to memorize eleven verses : Romans 5:1-11. I challenge you to use the 7’s method to memorize Romans 5:1-11. Learn it, know it, live it!

Why Paul?

There is a pressing question that the church of Jesus Christ needs desperately to address, but ignores and avoids like a giant elephant in the room, that provided the antifote for all the religious confusion all about us. It’s really a simple question: Why Paul? Why did the Lord reach down from heaven’s glory and save His chief enemy, Saul of Tarsus (Saul who had made it his mission in life to waste through churches of Jewish believers), and make him the Paul the Apostle? This short video will begin explaining this and we will continue to expound the reasons on Friday nights.

What’s the Key?

Do you know it? The key to understanding your Bible that is. You should God gave it to you right there on the pages of the good old King James Bible.

That’s the key, rightly divide. We’re even told how to do this. Christ gave Paul the instructions to give to us and that’s what we ought to be doing today.

That’s the general three-fold division in God’s dealings with mankind: times past, but now, and ages to come.

Times past explains the details of the division between the circumcision and uncirtcumcision, between Israel the nation and everyone else the Gentiles. If you find Israel or circumcision as the governing principle in a passage of scripture then you are in times past, the time period covered by the Old Testament as well as the four Gospels and the early Acts period. We aren’t in times past anywhere so going here for doctrine is a mistake that hinders our growth, edification and usefulness to the Lord.

But now is when the Gentiles are no longer afar off or set apart from God but through Israel’s fall and temporary setting aside and the middle wall of partition broken down. There is no.more Jew and Gentile just saved people by God’s grace alone in the body of Christ. This is us, the age we live in and it is detailed beginning in Acts 9 and continuing through all 13 of Paul’s epistles; Romans through Philemon which provide the doctrine for this Dispensation of grace. It contains the latest rinformation from Christ after his Ascension to heaven and glorification which He personally be gave to Paul when He shined down upon Saul of Tarsus who was killing the Jewish followers of Jesus saving him and making him the apostle to the Gentiles.

The ages to come is when God will bring his purposes for both heaven with the Body of Christ and Earth with Israel to fruition when the middle wall of partition is back up after the Body of Christ has been caught up to our home in the heavens. This is found in the books of Hebrews to Revelation,all very Jewish books written to the twelve tribes of Israel scattered abroad. That’s in the future and

The Exceeding Riches

of His grace. That’s a humbling and thrilling, exciting thought. That God loves us that much that we get the riches if His grace. I searched the phrase tonight and out of the top verses was this one:

The full passage is one of my favorites, it’s one I turn to again and again for strength and assurance when I am weak and weary.

But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, Even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, (by grace ye are saved;) And hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus: That in the ages to come he might shew the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward us through Christ Jesus. Ephesians 2:4‭-‬7 KJV

Just think on the promise there, the truth, the hope. We are made to sit together in heavenly places with Christ now, already, that is out standing even if our state is here on Earth, that in the ages to come when we our caught up with Him, physically, our status and state will be there, God will shew the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness towards us through His precious Son. Goodness but that is something to look forward to, so dwell on it as you go through your days as you dream at night and be ready for His exceeding riches.

Called to be Ambassadors

That was the phrase brought up in a conversation I had with a dear sister in Christ recently. We were talking about how hard sometimes it is to walk as a believer in a world that is ultimately very much against living in the way God says we should. We were lamenting the lack of modest clothing typically available for one thing. Over the weekend I was shopping when I glanced at the women’s section in our local box store and saw a pair of shorts that wouldn’t have fit the littles in my room on Sundays. Seriously they made Daisy dukes look like full britches! I thougt I’d just check out the grandma clothes surely there’s something decent there. Wrong, wrong, wrong! How could I be so silly as to think that maybe my mama wouldn’t want to wear a hot pants jumpsuit split to the navel! It gets harder and harder to find new modest clothing yet we are clearly not told in this verse how to present ourselves and hot pants and diapers ain’t fitting the bill.

The same can be said concerning men as well. Many of the skinny jeans and such being worn by them are a far cry from what most call modest. Not just in fit but there is a growing trend among men and women to dress boldly, flashy, blingy? It’s like they want to scream “I’m here look at me!!!” just by walking in a room. And I am not hating or downing anyone here, goodness knows I like me some glitter and sparkle, but I try to keep it in balance. I got a glittery phone case, I don’t glittery up my face. I might wear an opal ring (I think opals are so beautiful not only do they look like what the throne of God is described as but an opal is flawed, imperfect on it’s own but made breathtakingly beautiful when the light hits it, just we are when we have the light of Christ in us) if I had it or the mommy necklace my son got me but I’m not gonna look like I robbed a jewelry store. When we dress in the way God tells us it says a lot. First off it separates us from the world when we don’t dress so that we have to hide the eyes of nearby children to protect their innocence. Being different or separate from the world is good and also something God tells us we should do.

Denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, it’s not easy but we as grace women ought to strive at all costs to do so. Even if it means not dressing, acting, talking like the world. Maybe we don’t watch the same movies and TV shows (it’s Pureflix all the way here, if we try watching Hollywood movies I feel ill: the language, sex, darkness, it’s like a weight crushing me); don’t listen to the same music or read the same books. We are called to be ambassadors of Christ as members of His body and that position requires that we present ourselves accordingly.

When we are presenting ourselves as ambassadors of Christ, modestly, soberly, unworldly then we are reconciling ourselves to God. Not as in salvation for that was done by Christ’s finished work of the Cross, but as in being molded and shaped and useful for His purposes, much in the way a small child as it grows becomes reconciled to the ways of adulthood and family, maybe trained in a business or just walking in the path laid before them. That’s being an ambassador and that’s what I want to be. How about you?

Got Your Armor On?

That’s what I asked my littles this past Sunday and it got me thinking how we all need to ask ourselves that each day. Have we put on the whole armor of God, are we standing in the power of His might? Can you shout “Yes!” as those little ones do as you read through the following passage.

Finally, my brethren, be strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand. Stand therefore, having your loins girt about with truth, and having on the breastplate of righteousness; And your feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God: Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints; Ephesians 6:10‭-‬18 KJV

Whenever I feel weak and weary I go to that passage and just pour over it several times letting it strengthen me, arm me for the battles I face each day. The sword of the Spirit, the word of God, as my offensive weapon is my favorite piece of armor and the one I rely on the most along with the weapon most of us completely overlook in this list, praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit. That is our strongest defense as it is the source of our strength and fully enables us to put on and take up all the others. Prayer is the one thing we can do even when it seems all hope is lost and it is those prayers along with God’s word that make all the other pieces of the armor effective. So I ask are you gonna put your armor on?

Paul Taught Us All

I spend Sunday’s teaching the littles at the big “Church” about the gospel of God’s grace that we are saved through believing in the finished cross work of Christ alone and about rightly dividing the word of Truth. None of their families get it, they are religious and place certain works as playing a role in earning and keeping salvation. And none even know what 2 Timothy 2:15 even says as they read every Bible “version” but the KJB they all seem to think it means to properly “handle” God’s Word by making it say what ever they want. But I have an opportunity to teach these precious little ones God’s way to study His Word and understand it while they are little and have then memorize some key passages and doctrines early then when they trust Christ by placing their faith in His faithfulness and the sufficiency of His payment for their sins by His death burial and resurrection the they will already have a solid foundation upon which to build. That means I will be teaching them this song that helps make it clear what it means to rightly divide the word of Truth.