Archive for the ‘YOUTUBE CHRISTIAN’ Category

Yes, there is a land over the rainbow and it is called heaven.

1Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. 2I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. 3And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. 4He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”
5He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”

6He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life. 7He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son.

Remember, however, you must be made perfect to get into a perfect heaven, otherwise heaven would be corrupted.  Your soul becomes perfect when Jesus comes to live in your heart.

Have you ever heard the expression “the sun only shines on those who look towards it?”  The same is true with the homonym version:  “the Son [Jesus] only shines on those who look towards Him.”

All farmers know that sunshine is necessary for a harvest to occur.  In fact, nothing can grow without sunshine.  The same is true for us.  We can’t grow without the Son.

Another way to look at it is with a half filled glass of water.  Is your glass half empty or half full?

Today, think of the problems in your life and try to find new, positive  perspectives to see through.  Did you learn something from it?  If you are a Christian remember that God uses our mistakes/bad events to help us to grow.  He promises to work good from bad.  See how the amplified Bible renders Romans 8:28:

²⁸We are assured and know that [God being a partner in their labor] all things work together and are [fitting into a plan] for good to and for those who love God and are called according to [His] design and purpose.

Another rendering:

²⁸ And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them.

In other words, God will turn it around for good whether it is your mistake or trouble someone has brought your way.

Chasing after empty pleasure
Will not satisfy one’s heart;
But to those who follow Jesus,
Life’s fulfillment He’ll impart. —Sper

Only God can fill an empty heart.

I was wondering what I could add to this to make it more complete.  There is really nothing too much to add except I see so many people desperate for any type of peace and pleasure so they resort to temporary fixes such as alcohol and drugs.  You only dig yourself in deeper.  Your “inner chains” just wrap themselves around you tighter and tighter.

I don’t care how much you have messed your life up, tomorrow is a fresh new day with no mistakes in it.  Wipe your slate clean today.  Let God fill your empty, heavy, and sad heart. Click on the category “how to find Jesus” and find a new life today full of peace and satisfaction.  It doesn’t mean life will be easy and hard times will evaporate, but it does mean you won’t have to bear your burden alone anymore.

   ¹⁸“Come now, and let us reason together,” saith the LORD. “Though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. (Isaiah 1)

1As the deer pants and longs for the water brooks, so I pant and long for You, O God.
2My inner self thirsts for God, for the living God. When shall I come and behold the face of God? (Psalm 42)

Search me, Oh God, and know my heart today!

The purpose of the blog today is to get you into an attitude of worship and to search your heart and cry out to God. Remember, He is just one prayer away!.

If you are having trouble reading the Our Daily Bread devotional view the online version.
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One Mysterious God August 14, 2010 Our Daily Bread is hosted by Les Lamborn   READ: Isaiah 46:8-11 I am God, and there is none like Me. —Isaiah 46:9 My wife and I don’t always under- stand each other. For instance, it’s a great mystery to her how I can watch an entire baseball game between two teams that have no chance of making the playoffs. And I surely don’t understand her love of shopping. To love someone intensely doesn’t mean you have to understand him or her completely. That’s good news, because there’s no way we can begin to grasp the deep mysteries of the God we love. With our finite minds and our self-centered views, we can’t deduce why God does what He does. Yet some people look at tragedies, for instance, and turn their backs on God—assuming that their finite knowledge about the situation is better than His infinite wisdom. Indeed, if we could figure God out—if He were no more than a glorified human with no greater knowledge than that of the smartest person—where would be the awe and the majesty of the Almighty? One reason we know God to be so great is that we cannot reduce His thinking to ours. The apostle Paul asked, “Who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct Him?” (1 Cor. 2:16). Clearly, the answer is no one. Praise God that even when we don’t understand Him, we know we can trust Him. —Dave Branon Your ways, O Lord, are higher and Your knowledge is immense; So give us strength to trust You when Life doesn’t make much sense. —Sper To fully understand God is impossible; to worship Him is imperative.

From Gail

An attitide of gratitude is essential to maintain a healthy attitude during difficult times.  List things to be grateful for that you take for granted every day.  Are you basically living pain free?  Can you walk?  Can you see?  Do you take your freedom for granted?  The list is endless.  The way you perceive your life makes all the difference.

A grateful heart is a happy heart.  I giving heart is a happy heart.  Give of yourself today, even if it is just a happy smile!  The best therapy for depression is to give of yourself to make someone else happy.  As a psychology major, I know of a case that a depressed person, near suicide, starting making cookies for people in a homeless shelter.  Within a month, her depression had subsided.

 ³⁷“Judge not, and ye shall not be judged. Condemn not, and ye shall not be condemned. Forgive, and ye shall be forgiven. 
 ³⁸Give, and it shall be given unto you: good measure, pressed down and shaken together and running over…” (Luke 6)

    ⁸Our iniquities, our secret heart and its sins [which we would so like to conceal even from ourselves], You have set in the [revealing] light of Your countenance. (Psalm 90)

¹²Who can understand his errors? Cleanse Thou me from secret faults. (Psalm 19)

 ⁶Therefore pride compasseth them about as a chain; violence covereth them as a garment.  ⁷Their eyes stand out with fatness; they have more than heart could wish. ⁸They are corrupt, and speak wickedly concerning oppression; they speak loftily. ¹⁶When I thought to understand this, it was too painful for me, ¹⁷until I went into the sanctuary of God. Then understood I their end: ¹⁸surely Thou didst set them in slippery places. Thou didst cast them down into destruction! ¹⁹How they are brought into desolation, as in a moment! They are utterly consumed with terrors! (Psalm 73)

My blog is primarily concerned with positive articles with the intent to encourage you in your walk through the jungle of life. What positive message is in these passages?

First, God’s love mandates warnings.  Warnings are for our own good because he loves us.  What kind of parents wouldn’t warn or discipline their children of impending danger?  Only parents that love their children will do this.

Second, repentance is an easy thing to do if we love God more than ourselves.  God is so quick to forgive.

Today, ask God to reveal your secret sins in your subconscious mind.  You will be glad you did.  You will be a happier and more peaceful at heart if you did.  You will wonder whatever took you so long in praying this simple prayer.

Love and fear cannot dwell together.  By their very natures, they cannot exist side by side.  Evil is powerful and fear is one of evil’s most potent forces.

Therefore, a weak vacillating love can be soon routed by fear, whereas a perfect Love, a trusting Love, is immediately the Conqueror and fear, vanquished, flees in confusion.

But, I, [Jesus] am Love because God is Love and I and the Father are one.  So the only way to obtain this perfect Love that dispels fear, is to have me more and more in your lives.  You can only banish fear by my presence and my name.

Fear of the future–I am with you.

Fear of poverty–I will provide. 

You must not allow fear to enter.  Talk to Me.  Think of Me.  Talk of Me. Love Me. And that sense of My Power will so possess you that no fear can possess your mind.  Be strong in this My love.

Taken from God Calling.

There is a healthy fear of God and an unhealthy fear.  You should have a healthy fear of heights, for example.  It is the unhealthy paranoid fear of heights that cause the problems.  Gail

¹²And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you but [reverently] to fear the Lord your God, [that is] to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your [mind and] heart and with your entire being.   ¹³To keep the commandments of the Lord and His statutes which I command you today for your good? (Deuteronomy 10)

¹⁸There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. 19 We love because he first loved us.  (I John 4)

 7For God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind. (I Timothy 1)

About Our Daily Bread     |      RBC Ministries     |      Donate
He Already Knows August 2, 2010 Our Daily Bread is hosted by Les Lamborn   READ: Matthew 6:5-8 Do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him. —Matthew 6:8 A friend who is a commercial pilot told me about a flight in which he encountered a serious mechanical issue—a problem with dangerous implications. When the situation occurred, the warning lights in the cockpit informed him of the problem and he monitored it all the way to the destination, ultimately landing safely. Once on the ground, the pilot immediately went to the maintenance staff and reported it. To his surprise, the mechanics responded, “We already know about the problem and are ready to fix it. When you got the cockpit warning, we automatically got an electronic warning as well.” As he shared that incident, I couldn’t help but compare it to Jesus’ words about our heavenly Father: “Your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him” (Matt. 6:8). He said this in contrast to people who believe that they must “use vain repetitions . . . . For they think that they will be heard for their many words” (v.7). Jesus presupposes God’s knowledge of and concern for His children. Even though God knows our needs, He still wants us to share our hearts with Him. He stands ready to hear our prayer and to repair our brokenness by His grace. —Bill Crowder Although God knows our every need, His work He wants to share; He takes us into partnership By calling us to prayer. —D. De Haan Prayer is the voice of faith, trusting that God knows and cares.

From Gail:

“Be still and know that I am God.”  Psalm 46:10

We know and understand the second part of this verse, that God is who he says he is–it is the first part–”be still” we have problems with.

Backsliding in the Christian faith refers to those who lose their first love, and cease to be grateful for all the good things God has done for them.  A classic example is found in the Church of Ephesus.  Read what Jesus had to say to this church.

There are many forms of backsliding.  It comes it all shapes and sizes.  TV evangelism is many cases, although not all, encompasses backsliding when they decide making a average living off the gospel is not good enough–they have to get rich off it, thus turning into spiritual fat cats that cease to be of any earthly good.  Backsliding occurs when we lose our zeal for Christ.  We stop praying and believing.

Revelation 2

4But I have this [one charge to make] against you: that you have left (abandoned) the love that you had at first [you have deserted Me, your first love].

    2I know your industry and activities, laborious toil and trouble, and your patient endurance, and how you cannot tolerate wicked [men] and have tested and critically appraised those who call [themselves] apostles (special messengers of Christ) and yet are not, and have found them to be impostors and liars.

    3I know you are enduring patiently and are bearing up for My name’s sake, and you have not fainted or become exhausted or grown weary.

    What caused this beautiful church body to lose its way?  Look at all the good things Jesus had to say.

First, many impostors came into the church.  How many times have we been tempted to lose our faith because of the impostors in the evangelical community today?  They are liars to be sure, but how many of us blame God for this either directly or indirectly by not going to church anymore?  You go to church to worship God.  The solution might be to start a home church (see category for  home church). 

Second, we have desired the world over God.  Look at the parable of the sowers , especially the third soil type.

 7Other seed [of the same kind] fell among thorn plants, and the thistles grew and pressed together and utterly choked and suffocated it, and it yielded no grain.

    18And the ones sown among the thorns are others who hear the Word;

    19Then the cares and anxieties of the world and distractions of the age, and the pleasure and delight and false glamour and deceitfulness of riches, and the craving and passionate desire for other things creep in and choke and suffocate the Word, and it becomes fruitless.

Third, it is possible you never were serious about your relationship with Jesus to begin with.  Perhaps you accepted him as your savior for the wrong reasons–what he could do for you instead of what you can do for him.

Fourth and last, but not least, perhaps you feel abandoned by God.  You feel he quit caring so you quit caring.  I am finding more and more people that fall into this category.  They keep their feelings buried deep, but they suffer in silence.  The reason you feel this way primarily is because the Church as failed you, not God.  We are his tangible hands and feet, and when Christians become spiritual fat cats, they backslide and don’t feel the love of Christ enough to reach out to others.

Today, list some ways you have backslidden.  All of us are guilty of this, at least here in America.

Please remember that God does love you no matter how you feel. Remember always:

Praise him always!