Inspirations

The disciples message was simple, Jesus; that’s it, only Jesus.  They had no great theological reasoning.  Instead, they preached Jesus.  The very same Jesus they crucified and buried, rose again was indeed the God of the universe.  Wow!  What an amazing thought.  God used a bunch of unlearned “common” people with the simplest of messages to change the culture and turn the world upside down; the message of Jesus.  They could have spoken brilliant theological arguments but instead they spoke of Jesus. The simple message “that Jesus is the Christ” on their lips powered by the Holy Spirit changed the world.  Today the truth remains God still only needs ordinary men with the simple message of Jesus to change the world.  We don’t need to wait until we have more knowledge God can use us right where we are.  When we are faithful to speak the simple message of Jesus the Holy Spirit take over and people come to Christ.  The beau...

Come to Christ, they said; your life will be perfect, they said.  If your life is all messed up, follow Christ and your life will be perfect.  How many times have you ever heard this?  All of this sounds great, but unfortunately it doesn’t always work out like this.  Our life does not become instantly happy because and lovely just because we put our trust and faith in Christ.  In fact, often our life gets harder.  Instead of life on easy street we feel like we go straight from the frying pan to the fire.  Instead of everything getting easier, we find ourselves facing opposition, being ridiculed and persecuted.  Saul was on his way up the religious ladder.  He was persecuting followers of Jesus, for him, everything was looking up.  He met God and he was changed.  In an instant, he went from the persecutor to being persecuted.  For him, everything got suddenly harder.   In fact listen to Saul/Paul tell us...

So if the Son sets you free, you will be free indeed.  In Acts 5, John and the apostles were placed in prison.  During the night, an angel came and led them out of the prison.  They were set free.  In Acts 12, Peter is seized and thrown into prison.  Again Peter is guided out of prison in the middle of the night by a messenger of God.  He was freed from the grasp of the King.  Imagine the surprise to find the jail locked but the prisoners gone.  The prison could not hold them.  There has not been a prison created that can hold what God has set free.   If a physical prison cannot hold a person who God has decided should go free then prisons of the mind cannot hold us captive either.  All of us find ourselves in a cage at one time or another.  The same God who drew Peter and the apostles out of prison can set us free from the worst kind of prisons; the prisons of fear that we have built in our mind.   ...

“Can't even enjoy life right now Cuz I'm so scared of the future of this country and the world my kids are going to grow up in.”  This is a post I read the other day from a friend.  How about this one, “Struggling with some anger and fear over the many situations in our world that are way out of my control. I'm fighting the urge to share my lovely opinions and to vent my frustrations. But a far better thing to do is for me to get on my knees and simply ask our Lord, our Creator and Savior for help. He is loving and merciful and desires that people turn to him, so that is what I'm praying comes out of all of this mess.”    As I was talking with my daughter the other day, she said almost the same thing. I have a feeling if I polled people many of you about the condition of the world, the feelings would be the same.  Religious persecution is rampant; there have been outbreaks of diseases that they do not know how to cure; the economy is failing; ver...

A few days ago I gave my daughter these instructions as I left for work, “Do something with the chicken in the refrigerator for supper.”  The problem is that my daughter does not always deal well with such ambiguous instructions.  So after work, I decided to pick up something for supper just in case there was nothing ready to eat when I got home.  When I got home she had indeed made something using the chicken in the icebox.  I was pleased, to say the least.  I told my family I brought home fried chicken.  I also told them again the next day, at LEAST three times.  I am not usually a nag so why go through the bother of repeating it that many times?  Well, I know how easy it is to forget and I wanted them to be sure and eat it before it spoiled.  So I went to the trouble to remind them.  I am sure you have done the same thing in your home, for the same reason.  It’s something you want them to remember. In addition, at a ...

17  But the high priest rose up, and all who were with him (that is, the party of  the Sadducees), and filled with  jealousy   18  they arrested the apostles and  put them in the public prison.  Acts 5. As we go through Acts, One thing we see over and over again is that culture changing faith almost always brings with it opposition.  When we begin to catch a glimpse of God and his vision for us, and when we have the Spirit of God living in us it will change us.  Once we have been changed, some people will be drawn to us because they are looking and wanting something different than what they see in the world.  Others, however, will be threatened by the changes they see and that brings opposition.  What I love is the boldness that the first followers had in the midst of opposition.  Boldness to speak the truth to the people at Pentecost; boldness to tell the High Priest and the Sadducees, “We must obey God rather t...

Sometimes, if you’re like me, you just feel irritable.  The other day, I was working a shift in the middle of the day.  My sweetie likes to come and visit me during my lunch break.  I know he likes it so I let him.  This day as I got in the car, he asked what I wanted to do.  I said, “I don’t care I just need to get away from people for a little bit.”  Sometimes, when you’re in retail, when you’re on lunch you just want some alone time.  We ended up at a local fast food place for a quick lunch, which was really supper.  As we went in we were greeted by the youth pastor of our church and his wife.  They are always delightful and generous. The handed us some coupons and we chatted a little as we ordered.   We ordered and they sat in one part and we sat in another part of the dining room.  Later, as we got up to leave our pastors wife came up and apologized for not asking us to sit with them.  I was humbled...