Category Archives: EXPERIENCE GOD’S LOVE

OASIS WEEKEND.NEWTON TEXAS.07-31-2016

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Oasis_9Last weekend we went to First United Methodist Church in Newton, Texas.  The kids at John Wesley UMC, from grades 6-12, did a weekend mission trip.  We built a wheelchair ramp, and did a good deal of mowing and cleanup for several people in the community.  We had a Vacation Bible School for 49 kids. We worked in the Food Pantry (and Clothing Shop) of Newton, stocking and sorting. We had entertainment: A Youth Rally on Friday night, with live music, games, toys and free tee-shirts; and a movie for all ages on Saturday night, on the lawn in front of the Church, an animated feature called “Inside-Out”.  Popcorn, candy and drinks for all!

May not sound like such a big deal to some; but it was a big deal to us.  It was a memorable event.  We get to develop personal relationships with people in the community.  They love us, and we love them.  Everybody is happy to be nice to each other.  And the SPIRIT  is moving in Newton!  On Sunday morning, members of the church served the team breakfast, then we had church together, with the youth band leading the singing.  At the end we had a few testimonies from people in the community who were touched by the service of our kids.  No doubt, when it was over, everyone was blessed, and God was grinning!

 

DAILY QUIET TIME.050816

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Hands Praying on Bible            Luke 9: 23 says, “If anyone would follow me (be my disciple), let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.”  The point I want to focus on right now is about our daily habits. We can’t go many days without eating (and we certainly like to eat every day); we cannot live more than a few days without water; we have to sleep regularly, mostly every night. If we don’t go to work or school every day, we won’t last long in those endeavors. If we don’t do these things every day, we will languish, and diminish, and die.

I submit that if we don’t focus attention on our spiritual lives every day we will eventually wither and die spiritually. Because God wants so much to have a personal relationship with us, He gives us many, many extra chances to choose Him, so we won’t die forever (2 Peter 3:9). If we want to have a vibrant relationship with God, we must do it daily. We have to choose, this day, to serve Him. (Joshua 24:15) If we don’t eat daily, we won’t grow and develop properly physically; and if we don’t seek God daily, then we won’t grow and develop properly spiritually.

If anyone wants to draw near to God; if they want to develop a personal relationship with God; then they must focus their attention on God every day. The best times I have getting to know God better are the times when I take the time to: 1 Read the Bible and a devotional and let it soak in a little; 2 Read the prayer requests that I have received and think them over; both about the physical needs requested and about the spiritual needs that are represented by those requests; and then 3 kneel and talk to God; tell Him how much I want Him and how much I need Him in my life; about how thankful I am that He loves me and is taking care of me; about how much I love Him and how much I want to be more like Him and less like me, how I want to die to myself so He can live His life in me; and then I 4 wait; (and while I’m waiting),           I try to 5 listen for God about the needs in the prayer requests and how they relate to the Bible passage and the devotional. .
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CONSISTENCY.040516

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Open Your Heart Concept

“Consistency is the crutch of small minds.”  Tex (from a letter to my kids)

Some people said Jesus was inconsistent because He said people should abide by the law one time, and the next time He said people should be led by the Spirit, and be merciful to lawbreakers. Even in the Old Testament, God said He’d rather have someone with an obedient heart than sacrifice, even though sacrifice was according to the law.

Over and over in the Bible, it says that God looks at the heart.  Somehow or other it should be the way we look at it too.  I’m sure people ought to do what they say they will, but you don’t have to do the same way ever time. Different situations require different responses.

And this isn’t situation ethics either.  It is just realizing that we ascribe to a higher law, which is layman’s terms is being true to God and the people that God puts you with, above being true to man’s law or any dogmatic principle.  (How do you know which is is right?  If you’re seeking God, you’ll know.)  Like it says in the Bible, “This is the first and great commandment, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, . . . And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself.”  This is the fulfillment of all of the law and all of the prophets.  If you love God, you will keep His commandments; if you love your neighbor, you’ll treat him right.

My experience has been that if you abide by these two commandments, you won’t always appear consistent to the world, but you will usually do the right thing, and you will be consistent to God and in your heart.

RESISTING TEMPTATION.011816  

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ANXIETY CLOUD.121415

 

In this election year it’s hard to resist the temptation to dive into political commentary, particularly about who would make the best president; and what the candidates think about issues that I think are important.  I’m with Mary Harwell Salyer: “How far above politics You are, O Lord – high above the low-slung mud and lack of love shown for others, including…”  Can’t resist saying what a Godly courageous man Dr. King was; and I love his quotations floating around the ‘Net.  And while I don’t know who the best man is for the job, I also loved Dr. Carson’s comment at some speech last night, about the Powerball: “I already won the lottery. I was born in America & know the Lord”.

I also can’t help saying how much I love what Lysa TerKeurst said on Twitter early this morning, “We can’t possibly remain in Jesus and rant about others at the same time. Dear friends… Remember today to love even when we disagree;” and “Jesus made it clear. His command wasn’t to bash other people when we don’t agree. [He said] ‘This is my command: love each other,’ John 15:17.”

My real conclusion about commentary is this:  We, as Christians, have a much more important task and higher calling than to consume ourselves with the ‘cares of this world’ and the ‘deceitfulness of riches’. We actually have the Answer, our Lord Jesus; and while many among us would disagree, for all kinds of reasons, WE JUST MUST keep sharing Jesus, and His love and His grace and His mercy and His eternal salvation, because we are HIS representatives here on this earth, and WE JUST MUST keep on telling the world that there really is VICTORY IN JESUS and not get distracted by all the alternative stuff. 2 Corinthians 5:17-21.Religious Words on Grunge Background

HOPELESSLY DEVOTED TO YOU.122215

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Female choir conductor during performanceSounds crazy, but every time I hear this song from Grease, sung by Olivia Newton-John, I think about God, and about how I feel the same way about God that she felt about John Travolta.  I am hopelessly devoted.  Even if God didn’t love me back, I’d still be totally committed, totally surrendered to Jesus, because I know that He is my only hope, my only Deliverer, my only real LIFE.  In the song, Olivia says, “My head says I should leave, but my heart says to ‘hang on till the end’.”  Sometimes I feel that way.  My head says there’s just no sense in what’s going on. Why would God do that to me or to someone I love?  But my heart keeps saying what Peter said, when Jesus asked the disciples if they were going to leave Him too.  Peter said, “Where would we go?”  ‘Course God is different from John T.  God not only wants me, but He loved me when I didn’t want Him or love Him.  He’s there every minute, in my heart, telling me He’s taking care of me.

‘Devoted’ makes me think about ‘devotional’.  When I was a kid, maybe 8-10 years old, my momma would give me a copy of the Upper Room daily devotional, those little bitty books that had a few words about God for each day.  She said I ought to read it.  She didn’t say much else about it, about why I should read it.  I remember thinking, ‘I can read the Bible if I want to think about God, and I do read the Bible; so what do I need with some old person telling me what to think about God?”  So being young and dumb, I didn’t read it.  I think if she’d explained a little more to me about why it was a good idea, if I’d just think about God for a few minutes, early in the morning each day, that it would truly change my life; that I would begin to feel the Presence of God in my life from that one small daily act.  So, and this is truly humorous (and sad at the same time), I promptly started reading a devotional every day when I was about 54 years old.  Doesn’t take me long to get it, huh? Continue reading →

SMALL GROUPS FOR JESUS 3.111115

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drinks, communication, friendship and people concept - happy young women with cups sitting at table and talking in mall or cafeThis is my last post about “small groups for Jesus”, at least for the time being.  I just have a few more comments to make.

1] In my opinion, small groups are like family; they’re not about enforcing rules, and everybody being disciplined; they’re about letting God’s love flow through you into other people.  You may not believe this, but I’m convinced that almost every single person is acutely aware of their short-comings, and what they really need, on a regular basis, is encouragement and moral support.  (I find a lot of support for this attitude throughout the Bible; call it grace and mercy)  Small groups are, and should be, about sharing and expressing the fruits of the Spirit; and while self-control is one of the fruits and is therefore important to God and should be important to us; it is the very last thing on the list.  Wonder why that is?  (I don’t even know if there IS a hierarchy of the fruits, but I hear a lot more about love in the Bible than I do about self-control.)

2] One of the central, indispensible ingredients of a small group is trust.  Continue reading →

SMALL GROUPS FOR JESUS 2.111015

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aerial view of family eating pizza at homeThere are a lot of “small” groups in the world, where people get together on a regular basis.  I’ve been a member of a number of them, such as a foursome for playing golf every week.  You get  to know the guys.  You enjoy their company.  You tell jokes.  You catch up on what’s happening in their world, how they’re getting along with their wives and their kids, their bosses and their employees.  In a lot of cases you are closer to them than some members of their own families. And you have the benefit of a little fresh air and a little exercise. (very little) Maybe you have a beer in the 19th hole.

My mother had a long-standing relationship with a bunch of girls she formerly taught school with.  They’d get together and play bridge every week.  None of them were championship bridge players, but that wasn’t the point.  The reason they got together was to share their lives with each other. When they were down they could call each other on the phone and get a little encouragement.  When they were up they could have a special meeting to celebrate.  You know it’s a great thing to have a husband and some kids to share your life with, but the girls in the bridge club are an indispensible part of a full life too.  There’s just some things you can’t, or don’t want to, share with your husband.  LOL Continue reading →

MAKING DISCIPLES, WHAT DOES IT MEAN? 110415

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Walk on water with a businessman walking on the surface of an ocean as a business concept of confidence and courage to take on an impossible challenge and achieve success with the power of belief.

OK, In Matt. 28:18-20, Jesus says, “I have all authority, so go into all the world and make disciples, baptizing them .  .  .  teaching them .  .  . and [know this] I am with you always, even unto the end of the world [age].”  What does in mean, “Make disciples”?  Some say it means to get people to make a commitment to Jesus.  To “get ‘em saved”, so they go to heaven when they die, which many people call “having eternal life”, being “converted”, “born again”.

So I had this revelation just today.   In John 17:3, Jesus is praying, talking to God, and He says, among other things, “And this is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent.”  So how do you get eternal life?  Well John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes [trusts] in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting [eternal] life.”  So to get eternal life, you trust Jesus.  So what does the first verse mean when it says, “this IS eternal life, to KNOW GOD and JESUS.”  Sounds like eternal life means to know God and Jesus, to have a personal relationship with the ONE TRUE GOD, the eternal I AM. 

So when a preacher gets up in front of a congregation and says, “If the Spirit is moving in your heart, and you think you should make a commitment to Jesus, come on down, so you can go to heaven;” it means a whole lot more than that.  It means you can know the LIVING GOD for yourself.  You can know the WAY, the TRUTH and the LIFE, (real life) right here on the earth today.  You can experience the LOVE that only God can give, while you’re still here.  You can have rest and peace, the kind that passes all understanding!  It means you can be God’s instrument to touch the lives of others so they can be changed, be transformed, FOREVER.  Now that’s real ETERNAL LIFE!