The Silence of God :)

Today I decided to take a walk and to get to know the creator of the universe! I had heard that being quiet would make the voice of Jesus more distinct. Did I not know what I was getting into! I can't believe it! It's so true :) Jesus is there in the silence. As I sat in the car I just decided to “Be Still and Know” There truly is a lot of power in being still. For once in our lives we have to unplug all the stuff, and just go outside to a park or somewhere quiet and just listen. As you listen all you may hear is the noise of silence. Sometimes it seems like that is all God's answer to us is, but let's not forget that Silence is an answer. If we will listen to the silence, we can be taught more precious lessons of the Love of God than ever! Silence!!! It's so quieting and sometimes doesn't seem like anything is going on. Yet in the quiet we are sitting really close to God. Friend, I have a question to ask you. Have you ever gone for a walk, and listened. Maybe you hear nothing, and a lot of times you will, but are you willing to listen to silence as God's answer? Is silence such a bad thing? Is it the end of the world when God is silent. Are you going to melt? Does it mean that you have been forsaken by God? Does God's silence in your life mean that He does not care about you anymore? Don't ever believe such a lie! The TRUTH is that Jesus says to the raging storms in our lives “Peace be still” Can He not say to us when we are stressed out and being tossed back and forth: “Peace be still”? Does He not have the power to do that. The Bible is clear that when our hearts condemn us God is greater than our hearts and knoweth all things. Beloved if our hearts condemn us not then do we have faith in God? Let's have faith in Jesus and God, even when it seems He is silent, because it is in those times that He is the closest. Let me ask you a question. Have you ever had someone give you a big hug when you are feeling terrible and sitting down and crying? Usually when someone gives us a hug in those moments it is done in silence, because they want us to know that they care about us. Sometimes being silent is the best way to say that you care about someone. See through the silence to the Love of Jesus Christ. He is there when we need Him always. Sometimes He does not always have words to say to us, but that does not mean that He is not speaking to us. In my own life I have tried and tried to come up with things God might say in such and such an incident, and I have always tried to jump the gun because I have not been willing to wait until He sees fit to give me an answer. In today's society where it is rush here and rush there, it can be so difficult to give Jesus a little bit of time, and it is also just as difficult to wait through periods of apparent silence. But let's not run from the silence. Let's say that God is choosing to be silent to you. Who is not to say that He through the silence is teaching you to trust in Him? Maybe God will have you wait through many periods of silence, but it is not because He does not love you, because He does, He wants to teach us to quiet ourselves and to trust Him no matter what the situation. All could be falling down around you, but it doesn't matter because when God says it's time to be quiet, then it is time to be quiet and just trust. But YOU HAVE TO BE QUIET! You can't be going on and on in your mind and taking up councils with your doubts and fears, you have to let those go, and continue to listen to what you perceive as absolute silence and don't ever give up, even if you never receive an audible, or thought answer. Listen, listen, listen, listen. Listening is a process, for a guy like me it is very difficult, but I am learning that listening is necessary to our Christian experience. Maybe God's plan for your training is to take you through apparent silence many many times, and that is ok. So you sit there and wait... and.... silence.... ok, so wait a second. Now wait a minute, ok, wait an hour, maybe a day, or a month or a year or 10 years or 30 years or 100 years or a lifetime! Sometimes it is all about waiting. The Psalmist says “Be still and know that I am God: I will be exalted among the heathen, I will be exalted in the earth. The Lord of Hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah.”

No other merit but His!

This evening I had an interesting event happen to me. For the longest time I have been holding onto the idea that there is something I have to contribute to Salvation. I guess in the end it comes down to what I have already learned and that is that the only thing that we as human beings contributed was the sin problem. Ours was a contribution of pain, and ever has been because that is all that sin has ever or will ever cause. In Heaven it caused loss, and heartache, and on earth it continues to do the same. The only way that we can truly experience true freedom from the things that we have done is by Christ. Our faithfulness is not meritorious. It is Christ's faithfulness that is meritorious. This leads to a very interesting phenomenon that happens in the Christian life. When we come to the Bible with the attitude that there is some merit in what we do, we will find ourselves befuddled and ruined. In every story in the Bible it is God's merit and not our own. If we are studying the problem and deciding what to do like those in Acts were. They were wondering what their work was and Peter told them to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and that they would be saved. We must have faith that His merits are transferred into our lives. It is not by our works that these merits are given to us. This is the belief of Catholicism. They believe that there is “merit” in our actions. It is very easy to get the picture skewed and miss the entire point of the Story of Abraham. Abraham's whole attitude when asked to sacrifice his son was that God would provide a lamb. And in the same way our attitude needs to be the same. It is God who provides. No matter what the situation is, it is Jesus Christ who is our provider. The Bible says that “My God shall supply all your needs according to His riches in Christ Jesus” It is not we who supply our needs but God. We need to keep this in mind and trust Him to provide all of our needs :)

Through the Rough Times

"I will go before you and will level the mountains I will break down gates of bronze
and cut through bars of iron."

Isaiah 45:2

Have you ever had one of those days where things just did not seem to go right for you, and then when you looked at the future, it looked dark and forboding? I have just gotten out of one of those situations and I can tell you as a personal testimony that Jesus sets us free and has set me free from the worry that I faced. Now, the text to most Bible Scholars might not seem to be saying exactly what it is saying, but I believe that the words are for us today. The actual context is talking about Cyrus, and it is a prophecy concerning how he is going to overthrow Babylon, and it is about how God is going to go before Cyrus. The question comes that if God promises to do this in the overthrow of Babylon, will God do this in our own lives. The Bible is clear. If we were to look at the book of Revelation, Babylon is mentioned time and time again. Babylon stands for a "do it yourself" attitude. Yet God promised deliverance to Israel through Cyrus, and in the same way He promised deliverance from sin through Christ. Now the amazing thing is that last night I was really worried about the future, and so was my wife, but we decided to call on the most powerful name in all the universe: Jesus. When we did, peace flooded our hearts and we felt better about the future. Today I decided that I was going to spend time only reading one verse a day out of Isaiah 45 and let that verse soak in. What happened was amazing. I did not get around to reading the verse until this evening, but as I read it, I was amazed. God promised to go before me and make the rough places smooth. God was not just speaking to Cyrus, I believe that He was speaking individually to us here too! I believe that this is a promise for us as much as it is for Cyrus. We could take this verse and apply it to our lives in many many ways, and the way that this applied to my life today was simply astounding. After reading the verse in the Bible, I looked at my computer screen, and there I saw a picture and the picture was of Jesus. His arms were stretched and bleeding, and there were stripes all over his chest, and as I read that promise it all occured to me that God had kept His word, He had made the rough places smooth, it was now only a matter of me accepting personally again today what He had done for me so long ago. That verse is an allusion to Jesus dying for us on the cross. He paid the ultimate price so that He could make the rough places smooth, and shatter the doors of bronze. His promise is to you friend, you can claim it right now for yourself. Jesus promises to go before you, and He will. Hang on to Him, because He will never leave you or forsake you, you always have a friend in Jesus, and remember that He goes before you:)

An interesting dream I had last night

Last night I had a very interesting dream. Now one would not usually think that dreams have that much important to tell you. Last night, however I learned something very important from my dream. I learned that the kingdom that we are closest to will be the one that influences us the most. There are two kingdoms that we can choose to be closest to, and the first kingdom is the kingdom of darkness. This kingdom is filled with all kinds of selfishness and sin, and all the bad things that we can think of. Then there is the Kingdom of Heaven, which is full of love joy peace, and all the fruits of the Spirit. You see friends, the issue is not so much over what you do, but rather with whom you associate and are closer to. The closer you are to Jesus the more you will become like Him, and the closer you are to the world, the more you will become like the world. It is your choice:) God gave you and I the choice of who we are going to spend our time with. I pray that anyone reading this will choose to spend their time with Jesus. In fact, right now I am going to read a chapter out of the Desire of Ages. This is an excellent book on the life of Christ, and great for getting to know Him better. Always remember it is by beholding that we become changed. If you would like to be more like Jesus, spend time with Him. Don't try and change yourself, that change will come supernaturally and unnoticably as you spend time with Jesus.

My prayer for anyone who is reading this is that they will make the effort to spend time with Jesus, because that is where real transforming power comes from:)

At the Last Trump

There has not been a blog written here in a long time, but that is because I have not really felt the urge to write, that is until now. I really have something I have to share with everyone, especially as this world is falling to pieces all around. Friends I want you to know that you do have hope. This hope cannot be found in anything this world has to offer, but instead in what Jesus has to offer. Right now the swine flu is in full swing, and people are getting sick from it left and right. Now I know I live kind of far away from all of that, but what do I do if it hits me? So many people are afraid, and maybe you are right now yourself. I know at first I was afraid too. It's kind of hard to not be afraid when you hear it being splashed all over the internet and the news. Every time I get onto MSN it is another update on the swine flu, and even some of my friends are worried that they might have it. I know, things look pretty black right now for this world, yet we have a friend who promised us that they would get black, but He promised us this so that we would not be worried. Fear and worry does not help us in this life. Let's take hold of the One who holds this world in place. Let's go to Him with our worries, and friends, I promise you that He will calm your fears and give you the assurance that you are so desperately seeking. Friends, read your Bible! There is no better time to get in touch with the King of the universe than now. Please, please, get to know Jesus, He loves you, and He wants to be with you. Jesus says "In this world you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world." Right now we are having trouble. There is the swine flu, economic crisis, families breaking apart, people killing each other, and wars. We have had terrible earth quakes. I believe it is time that we wake up, and come to Jesus, while there is still time! Go to Him friend, there is hope for you, there is hope for me to! Let's hang on to Him, because He promises to bring us through this time of trouble. There is a verse that has really helped me in my fear of death and worry:

Romans 8: 31What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32He who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all—how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things? 33Who will bring any charge against those whom God has chosen? It is God who justifies. 34Who is he that condemns? Christ Jesus, who died—more than that, who was raised to life—is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us. 35Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword? 36As it is written:
"For your sake we face death all day long;
we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered."l]" class="footnote">[l] 37No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons,m]" class="footnote">[m] neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Take that fear and death! Jesus is king, and nothing can pull us apart from Him or His love for us. Don't be afraid of what's to come, Jesus is already there! He's also in the future too! He's the Alpha and Omega! Don't be afraid. Jesus promised us in Matthew:

Mat 28:19

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
Mat 28:20

teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age."
He who testifies to these things says, "Surely I am coming soon." Amen. Come, Lord Jesus!

Don't worry friend, Jesus is with you, always, to the end of the age, turn to Him now and ask for His peace that passes all understanding, and ask for His yoke, because it is easy and His burden is light. He will come and rescue us, let's not loose heart:)


Rev 22:20

What a Friend we have in Jesus!

Hi, well I know it has been a very long time since I have last written on the blog. But something has happened to me, that I cannot keep silent about. It happened to me tonight, as I got down on my knees and gave my heart back to Jesus. I had a wonderful conversation with the King of the Universe Himself. There were so many things in my life that had fallen to pieces. The first thing to fall apart, was my prayer life. Friends! I cannot stress this enough. It is so important that we make time for Jesus. He loves us and wants what is best for us, but if we are not willing to spend time talking to Him and surrendering to Him how can He help us. As I prayed tonight about surrendering something that was very difficult a story came to my mind that had been told at an evangelistic series. The story was about a little boy who would not shake a man's hand because he had a marble clenched in his own hand. The hand he would not shake was Dwight Moody's hand. Finally the fingers were opened, and the marble was taken. So many times in life, we have things that we just don't want to give to God. We end up holding onto them like that little marble, and won't let them go. I was no different. So tonight I prayed that if Jesus wanted me to give up the marble, or the thing I was holding onto in my life, that He would take it, because I did not have the strength to give it, and do you know what He told me! He told me that He would take care of it! You see friends, we do not go about our lives looking at all the things we are or are not doing right. No! That is not the right place to start. Instead the right place to start is by coming to Jesus and talking to Him. My life was falling apart, and my actions were following accordingly, and the reason for that was a struggle that I was facing inside, of something I did not have the strength to give up, and I knew it. Yet the amazing thing is that God works in us. Our only duty friends is to spend time with Jesus. We must talk to Him, and share our burdens with Him, and then we must read His Word, and then once again ask Him to do the things that we cannot do. I cannot tell you how many times Jesus has come to my rescue and been there for me. He will do the same for you too! Why don't you ask Him to come into your life. It doesn't matter what you have done, or may be doing. Come to Jesus!. The following verse is a verse we went over in my Revelation class. I found it to be very encouraging, and I just want you to know that Jesus message to me, goes for you too!
17The Spirit and the bride say, "Come!" And let him who hears say, "Come!" Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life.

Single and Satisfied

This morning I woke up to the foggy day. Today is a momentous day for me! I deleted my adventist singles account today. I am going to leave the whole girl friend thing in God's hands, because He is big enough to handle that problem. I am going to learn to be satisfied with the life that He has given me. I am so thankful to God for everything that He has done. Even though I do not have a girl friend, I praise God for the opportunity to learn contentment in Him. Afterall that is where true contentment comes from. Maybe you are struggling in your life right now, well, friend, God wants you to know that He loves you, and you can be content with the life that He has given you, I am learning that it is best to be in God's hands rather than the worlds. I know that God has that perfect person out there for me, it is just a matter of waiting on His timing, so that is what I am doing, or am learning to do. Instead of working on putting my energy in having a girl friend, I am going to put that energy into enjoying the present, and what God has for me here and now.
Keep your life free from love of money, and be content with what you have, for he has said, "I will never leave you nor forsake you." Hebrews 13:5