Overloaded!!

Overloaded!! WAAAAAYYYY overloaded!!

Do you ever feel this way? I sure do!

As a matter of fact, this is my first attempt at a blog this week just because I have felt so overloaded.

By overloaded, I mean too many important things to do in the time it seems that I have in which to do them.

But I have to face the reality that my days have the same 24 hours in them that everyone else's days do so the problem of overloading must be mine. There seems to be something inherently wrong with the way I do things.

I am excited about this today because God has reminded me what it is that I'm doing wrong.

I am seeking to do the things He has brought to me to do, FOR Him rather than WITH Him, and there is all the difference in the world.

Our wonderful Heavenly Father loves us so much that when He saves us, He comes to live inside us. Holy Spirit takes up permanent residence in our hearts. God doesn't save us to continue to be apart from us. He saves us to be with us in the most intimate way possible.

He (and what He wants is really what should matter) wants to be with us and wants us to be with Him in all that we do.

I actually have come to believe that He despises it when we do things FOR Him.

But He loves it when we do things WITH Him.

And overloaded is what we feel when we are operating FOR Him out of our own power and strength rather than WITH Him out of His power and strength.

If you don't believe this will make a difference, just try it. I think you'll find what God has helped me find; doing things WITH Him is a lot easier and less stressful than doing things FOR Him.

Now, Dear Father, Help me to practice what You've shown me. Knowledge not put into practice is just information. It does little good.

Please pray for Revival. I'll help to remind you each day.

In His Love
Walter

Religion VS Relationship

There was an editorial in yesterday's Atlanta Journal-Constitution that addressed the decline of religion in America.

I suppose the writer, Leonard Pitts, thought that religion's decline was a bad thing for he seemed to offer some suggestions about how religion could be better.

Well, religion can never be any better than it is right now and right now religion is worth the same thing it was worth yesterday and that is nothing.

You see, religion is a man-made substitute for a relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

Religion uses some key relationship words like worship, sacrifice, kindness, forgiveness and other things but religion uses these words in the context of Man seeking to please some deity (people worship unusual things) through Man's own efforts.

God's own Holy Word tells us that pleasing Him that way can't be done. The concept of pleasing God by what we do is a works mentality and Man falls for it at almost every opportunity. There is something appealing to Man about doing something to "pay for" his salvation rather than receiving it at the free gift of God's grace.

But God has taught us, "For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast." Eph. 2:8-9 KJV

It is so easy even for Christians to slip out of the freedom of the practice of a relationship with Christ in the the slavery of the practice of religious activity around Christ.

Don't let your focus be anywhere else today but on Jesus. When He called us, He did not call us to follow a recipe for Christian living; He called us to follow Him.

There is all the difference in the world.

Make Jesus your focus today. He is all there is that is truly worth seeing anyway.

Please pray for revival. Please.
In His Love
Walter

Tools

Tools come in all shapes and sizes. Many things that are tools are not thought of as tools. For example, when is the last time you thought of that pencil on your desk as a tool? We think of pencils as writing instruments, use them as drumsticks, but seldom place them in our mental category of tools.

I am typing this on a computer. I often think of this instrument as a communications device, a type of entertainment (hey, I like to play Free Cell, don't you?), a place to store information or a way to find information, but I seldom call it a tool.

But that is what it is, a tool.

Tools can be used for good or evil.

A hammer that drives nails to build a house can be used to commit murder. A gun meant for use as a hunting tool can be used as a weapon of destruction. A computer meant for many good uses can be used to poison the minds of many.

Statistics reveal that well over 50% of adult males who regularly attend church have willingly, deliberately viewed pornography in the last 7 days. These viewings were not something that was stumbled on by accident, but willingly and deliberately sought and viewed.

Those same statistics reveal that well over 50% of the pastors of churches have willingly and deliberately viewed pornography in the last 3 months.

Tools used for sermon preparation used to plant poison in the minds of those who deliver those sermons.

Ladies, please don't be too harsh with us men. Tools meant for good are all too often used for evil purposes by many, male and female.

Folks, we need to consecrate not only our minds but our possessions and tools to the glory of God. Only when they are fully given to Him are we able to use them properly and glean all the benefit of having them.

Never let anything He can use for blessing be used instead for evil. Consecrate your mind, heart and belongings to Him today.

Please pray for revival. Never stop seeking Him for revival. Only He can drive out pornography, drug dependency, alcoholism and the like. We need a Great Awakening Revival. Pray for it, please.

In His Love
Walter

Great Deals

There are lots of great deals available in the marketplace today. That is, if you choose to believe the advertising that's being done now.

I heard this morning that an insurance company that is well known for their reptilian spokesanimal has just reduced their rates in Georgia on automobile insurance.

They also stressed that you could buy it over the phone, from a representative or on-line. Gee Whiz!! How easy can something be?

Low rates. Easy to purchase. Convenient. Good coverage, too. At least they think so.

Let me tell you about the best deal mankind has ever known.

It's free. It is easy to obtain. You can get it anywhere, anytime. No telephone needed. No computer necessary. You don't even have to deal with a special representative.

You deal directly with the Boss.

He also happens to be the Creator of the universe and all that has ever been.

But He has time for you. You don't need an appointment. You don't need any money. You just need to be willing to believe that Jesus, God in the flesh, came to earth, lived a sinless life, died FOR YOU on a cross at Calvary to pay the debt YOU owed God because of your sins, was buried, rose three days later and now has ascended into Heaven where He awaits the arrival of all who have chosen to place their faith in Him for salvation.

A certain insurance company may have made protection for your car cheap and convenient.

Jesus has made provision for your eternal soul free and as simple as bowing your head wherever you are, whatever else you are doing, and giving your life, heart and faith to Him.

Looking for a great deal today? This is it. The best deal of all time.

If you've already taken Christ up on His offer, be sure and tell someone else about it so that they can be blessed too.

Hey! If you would tell a neighbor about a great sale at a department store, wouldn't it be even better to tell them about the free salvation of Christ?

Sure it would!

Also, please pray for revival for our nation. We need God's power and presence to be poured out on us all.

In His Love
Walter

Plans For Today

Have you made any plans for today? Most of the time, it seems that the day makes plans for us.

We are creatures of habit and that helps the day take responsibility for us instead of us taking responsibility for the day.

Let me suggest an option for you to consider today.

Instead of letting routine set your agenda, give some consideration to breaking free of your regular schedule and spending some quality time with God.

God created us with the ability to do many things and it seems that we often think that He is interested only in what we can do for Him.

But the truth is that He created us for fellowship with Him and today He wants to hold you and love you more than He wants you to accomplish anything.

When you have finished reading this missive, close your eyes for a few minutes and picture yourself sitting on a porch in the mountains or on a deck overlooking the beach, in a rocking chair, sitting like a child in your Heavenly Father's arms.

Enjoy the peacefulness. Enjoy the beauty. Talk to Him. Listen as He speaks to you. Feel the love and warmth of His arms. Feel the strength He has and be assured that He uses His might on your behalf everyday.

Let your burdens drain from your mind into His Spirit. Give Him all your cares. Laugh in joy as you empty into Him and He fills you with Himself.

Doesn't this kind of time with Him bless you and make you feel wonderful?

Isn't this something that should become the dominant and first part of your daily routine?

God loves you today. As much as He ever has, as much as He ever will, as much as He is able and that's a lot.

Celebrate and live in this love today.

It could be the best day you've had in quite a while.

Do it again tomorrow. It could get better and better everyday.

Please pray for revival. Don't forget. Don't neglect. Just pray. He is listening.

In His Love
Walter

Opportunity

Today is a day of great opportunity. Yesterday was a day of great opportunity and tomorrow, should God give it to us, will be a day of great opportunity.

I know that the economic outlook is not the best it's ever been right now, but that really is the root of the great opportunities that are before us now.

As we watch Wall Street go up and down, as we hear and read news of jobs lost and governmental debt mounting, people are wanting to hear about something steady and unchanging, something (someone, actually) dependable no matter what the circumstances of life are.

That Someone is Jesus. That Something is a Savior.

Our Jesus is the same, yesterday, today and forever and He is exactly the Dependable Rock, the Unfailing Anchor, the Indestructible Shelter that so many people today need from the storms of life that are raging all around us.

With the difficulties of life that surround us right now, we have opportunities like never before to point people to the steady, unchanging love of God in Christ Jesus.

It is our joy and privilege as well as our responsibility to do so.

People today need Jesus. Those of us who know Him as Savior and Lord can tell them about Him and His great love.

In the midst of economic troubles, we can show others how to be richer than they've ever been before with riches that cannot rot, fade away or be stolen.

The love and care of Our Savior is not dependent in any way on the ups and downs of Wall Street.

His Heavenly riches are poured out at His in accordance with His promise, not according to governmental bailouts.

He delivers us from sin debt rather than saddle us with bailout debt.

Instead of lamenting the economy today, how about sharing the joy of Jesus?

Both you and this old world we live in will be a better place because of it.

And please, remember to pray for revival. Fervently. Consistently. Insistently.

God is listening. He is preparing to act. Just pray.

In His Love
Walter

I Missed Yesterday

I missed doing this blog yesterday. I was learning something new. I was being taught how to organize my work on the computer.

I can now create a folder!!

That may not seem like much to many of you, but to me it's a big deal.

I also learned how to use one of those flash drive thingies that you plug into a USB port!!

Wow! Even if I don't know anything else, I can really use the words, can't I?

Seriously, it was fun to do and I hope that I can remember all I was taught.

I'll probably have to be reminded along the way, especially if I don't do these tasks at least occasionally, so that I can remain proficient at performing them.

It's a lot like the teachings of God. So much of what we learn we do not put into practice as a regular part of Christian living and we forget that we are to do these things for our good and Christ's glory.

Forgiveness, for example. In The Lord's Prayer, Jesus taught us to pray, "and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us."

We remember to ask God to forgive us, but we don't practice forgiveness of others enough and it becomes almost as if we have forgotten that God requires us to forgive.

And so we have to be reminded to forgive others.

Specifically thankful prayer, for another example. We seem to remember very well how to outline our needs and desires when we go to God in prayer but when it comes to being thankful for all He has done, the best many seem to be able to do is to use a few generic words about "thanks for my blessings."

How much better it would be for us to be specifically thankful for the blessings, and generically ask God to meet our needs.

It's a matter of practice. And being reminded.

And, just as I can get better at operating a computer in all its intended ways if I practice, so we can all get better at the Christian life if we practice it.

God calls it sanctification, or growing to be more like Jesus, or being conformed to the image of His Son.

There's nothing better on earth to desire to get better at than being like Jesus.

Please pray. For revival. Everyday. Many times a day. God will give it. Let's just be faithful to keep praying for it.

In His Love
Walter

Faith In God

An abortion has taken place in Brazil. Abortions are illegal in Brazil but the government can override the law in what they consider special circumstances.



The pregnant female was only 9 years old. She was pregnant with twins. She was supposedly raped by her stepfather.



That would constitute a special circumstance and the officials charged with making this decision said that they did so because the pregnancy endangered the life of the girl.



The Catholic Church in Brazil protested, but to no avail.



How do you feel about this circumstance?



It is indeed a horrible thing that an adult would rape a 9 year old. And one has to wonder how it was that her body could conceive at such a young age.



But what about the two babies that were killed and discarded?



Who were they? What might they have meant to the world?



It is likely in our present society that pre-natal testing would have resulted in the abortion of Beethoven. His testing would have indicated a less than perfect fetus.



In our present society it is likely that the great Methodist preacher John Wesley would have been aborted. His parents were poor and he was child number 15.

It is possible that one of these two aborted babies would have been a doctor who would discover the cure for cancer of the common cold.

The other child might have been a physicist and discovered how to make fuel instantly from the air.

What about God? Couldn't He have prevented this? Couldn't He have protected these babies or have placed them in the womb of another female?

Yes, He could have.

But the point is that He didn't. He created two lives and allowed those lives to be revealed in the body of a nine year old girl who had been raped and by this allowance He issued a challenge to trust Him, to have faith in Him.

Maybe this was considered, maybe not. But it should have been.

People, in their arrogance about knowing what is right, in their great ability to see into the future and know how things are going to turn out, said, "This cannot turn out well. We must kill these babies."

My Bible, God's Word, still says "Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding." Pro. 3:5 KJV

Someone, somewhere, trusted in their own understanding rather than having faith in God that He knew all about that young girl and her stepfather and those babies. And they killed those babies.

And we are diminished because of it. We will never know exactly how diminished we are because we will never know what God would have done with those two lives. We will never know what we have taken away from ourselves and how we might have been enriched through the lives of those two babies.

God can make good out of anything, you know.

Worldwide, we have diminished ourselves millions of times now through the killing of unborn babies.

How much brighter would our world be today if we had their little child smiles and their little child laughter? How much different would our world be today if we had never embraced this kind of killing?

All it would have taken is faith in God.

We seem to have trouble believing that God can be God if we'd get out of the way and let Him.

Please pray for revival. And have faith in God. In every circumstance of life. He can handle it.

In His Love
Walter

The Church Sign

There are many neat sayings that go on church signs.

I saw one this morning that I had seen before and maybe you have, too, but because of its relevance to the recent topic of faith, I thought I'd share it with you.

"Belief thinks God can. Faith knows God will."

I wrote the other day that faith is demonstrated by action. And I stand by that. I just want to emphasize that sometimes that action must be mental.

In the case of our national situation right now, the most important action we can take to demonstrate our faith that "God will" act on our behalf to make good on His promise that "all things work together for good" is the mental action of changing our attitudes and our faces.

Think about it. A faithless attitude and the sad face that goes with it is going to go from person to person like a wildfire goes from tree to tree until everybody is down-in-the-mouth about our nation. And the more down-in-the-mouth we feel, the more down-in-the-mouth we act and the situation we would like to get better gets worse because we have a faithless attitude and look like it wherever we go.

When we change our attitude from one of believing "God can" to one of knowing that "God will" and put a look of joyful confidence and expectation on our faces, that attitude then spreads from person to person, maybe not as quickly as the wildfire example above because people seem to love bad news far more than good news, but it will spread and the situation we want to get better actually does get better.

A good dose of positive faith in God that He will, rather than that He can, will go a long way toward improving the health of our nation in every way, not just economically.

How about this? Apply these verses to everything in your life for a few days and see if your outlook doesn't improve and see if your improved outlook doesn't improve the outlooks of others.

Here are the verses. Proverbs 3:5-6, KJV; "Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths."

The world might just be amazed at what a change in attitude, reflected on our faces, can accomplish.

You already believe He can. Will you now know that He will?

Pray, please. For revival. Pray for others who will join you in prayer. Seek God. He will be there to hear you.

In His Love
Walter

The Agony and The Ecstasy

I experienced agony and ecstasy on the way to work this morning as I listened to a song on the radio.

The song was "Why Me, Lord?" I believe it was written by Shel Silverstein. I know that Kris Kristofferson and Christy Lane have both recorded it.

I cried twice as it was played today.

The first tears came as the Christy Lane sang these lines; "Lord, help me, Jesus, I've wasted it. So help me, Jesus, I know what I've done."

I cried because I identified so much with that line. I know what I've done. And I don't mean the good things. I mean the sins that I have committed against God. They have been many and they have been grievous.

I cried because I wish so much that I had never sinned or that I could wipe them away.

The song went on and Miss Lane came to another line that moved me to tears. "Lord, Help me, Jesus, I've wasted it. So help me, Jesus, I know who I am."

Now I can't be sure what the writer meant by that line. If you think about it, it could be interpreted two ways. It could be another statement lamenting what sin had done.

But the Lord used it to speak to me in my tears to remind me that in Christ I am now not what I used to be. I am saved. I am cleansed. I am different.

Those of you who know me well may be thinking negatively right now. That's okay. Listen to this. I'm not who or what I ought to be all the time, you're right. But I'm not what I used to be either. And I can tell you that God is still working on me night and day so that I'm not yet all that I'm gonna be by His power and to His glory.

I know what I am. I am His. Not because of anything I have done but because He has chosen to love me. He has chosen to love me in spite of my sins. In His great love for me, He graciously offered to save me, cleanse me by the blood of Jesus and I took Him up on His offer.

Yes, I remember what I've done not to deserve His love and salvation. And I know what I am because of His love and salvation.

I think the remembering of why I shouldn't be saved and blessed makes the reality that I am saved and blessed that much sweeter.

I enjoyed the agony and the ecstasy today. If you know Christ as your Lord and Savior, then you can celebrate both today as well.

If you don't know Him in the way of salvation, invite Him to come into your heart today. He'll change you, cleanse you, save you, love you.

It truly will be ecstasy.

Pray please. For revival.

In His Love
Walter

The Word Is FAITH

I got a call over the weekend from someone who reads these blogs. This person wanted to discuss one from last week that I had titled, "Rescue."

The caller pointed out to me that I had come close to but had failed to use the one word that would really convey what I was trying to say. The word is FAITH.

He pointed out to me that I had danced all around it and that some perhaps would get it but that I needed to come right out and say (write) that what out nation needs is faith in God. The caller firmly believes, as I do, that we have lost our national faith in God.

We have turned more and more to government, etc. and that's not going to get the job done.

We need FAITH IN GOD. We need to remember that He is in control and that we can have faith that He will work out His purposes and His goals. We need to have faith in Him that He does what is best, what is right, what is holy and what is good for His people.

We also need to remember that faith requires action.

It is one thing to say we have faith. It is quite another thing to act on that faith.

God spoke through James to say to us that, "faith without works is dead." James 4: 20 KJV

God also challenged us through James when He said, "Shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works." James 4: 18 KJV

That challenge is meant to convey to us that we cannot demonstrate faith without the action of works or acting on our faith.

In the midst of our national need, demonstrating that we have faith in God, if indeed we do, means holding our heads high even in the toughest of times. It means speaking words of hope rather than continual despair. It means being focused on God Who is in control rather than focused on an economy that seems out of control.

God's promise to His people is that, "all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose." Romans 8: 28 KJV

It may go against the grain of what the world would have us do, but we need to have faith and then show our faith.

Praise God in the midst of these troubled times. Get excited about watching and waiting to see just what He is going to do. Celebrate all the ways He chooses to confound those who consider themselves wise.

And don't let your faith be challenged by those who choose not to have it or exercise it. Go to Psalm 91 and be blessed by words like these; "A thousand shall fall at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not come nigh thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou behold and see the reward of the wicked. Because thou hast made the Lord, which is my refuge, even the Most High, thy habitation, there shall no evil befall thee, neither shall any plague come nigh thy dwelling. Psalm 91: 7-10 KJV

The word, the practice is FAITH. In God and God alone.

Please pray for revival. A sweeping great awakening for our nation.

In His Love
Walter