It has been a week since I published that first post and started on this journey.  I am mainly writing this just to say thank you to all of those who have visited, read, and commented.  And thank you to everyone who has personally encouraged me.  I am still learning the ins and outs of the software and trying to make this an interesting place to visit.  That is why it may look a little different every time you visit.

I love reading the comments and will try to respond when I have time and if the comment warrants it.  I am also trying to establish in my mind how personal I want to be.  I have always been a private person.  I want to share Jesus and what He has did for me but I still wrestle with how much of me is going to be exposed to the world. 

Your time is appreciated and your prayers are coveted.  Again, this is just a quick post to say thank you, and I

Love you all

Tags: Blogging, Thanks

Psa 139:14  I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. ESV

I work in construction; cabinet sales, design and installation; and before this year started I was overwhelmed with more work than I could stand, almost.  It was financially rewarding but temporally taxing.  I had no time to do much more than work and go to church.  I had no clue what a blog was. 

Then the work came to almost a screeching halt.  A lot of people in the construction industry are not doing too well right now. Please pray with us and for us.

But that is not what I want to write about.  It is simply that I have quite a bit more time on my hands and this is how I started finding blogs and forums and online communities.  At first it was not that interesting to me.  People writing about politics and sports, their families and pets, and a vast array of other topics, didn’t hold my interest very long.  Then I found a site called Evangelical Outpost and I read quite a bit of its archives.  I was hooked.  Then I found some others like Parchment and Pen and Theologica.  All of these led to more than I could keep up with.  It made me want to write.

You see, I love talking about God.  What Jesus did for me is just so amazingly mind boggling that I can’t shut up.  So, since I spend more time alone than with people, this is an excellent way to keep me from just talking to myself or to God about Himself.  Although, that has been quite rewarding itself.  But God does want us to do the work He has left us to do.  To fight the battles that are before us.  This is just one of the ways I am following His orders.   

But there was a big problem.  I didn’t feel like I could possibly have any impact.  I wanted to have the writing skill that my brother in Christ, Shannon Mimbs, has.  I wanted to reflect the deep insight I detect in the posts of Dan at Cerulean Sanctum.  I didn’t want to make spelling or grammatical errors that would be out there for all the world to see.  (Like that might happen)  But finally, and I truly believe God told me this, I realized that it didn’t matter.  I was not supposed to be any of those others. 

David wrote the passage in the Psalms that I used above, and it applies to us all.  You and I were fearfully and wonderfully made.  We are precious in the eyes of God.  (1Pe 2:4)  Each and every one of us has a role to play, a part to do, a mission to accomplish.  (Eph 4:16)  We all have been given gifts to use in service to one another.  (1Pe 4:10) We are unique, one of a kind, and this is how God made us. 

We appraise and valuate a thing based on a few criteria.  A gem will be worth more if it is rare and or unique.  Gold’s valuation is determined on its scarcity and beauty.  An original piece of art is worth so much more than the best copy.  It has always amazed me that a forgery of art that is so good it may not be detected for years, once it is exposed, becomes worthless.  Copies are not worth a thing.  Even if almost perfect. 

So I don’t need to be you.  And you don’t need to be me.  We are the way we are and with the help of the Holy Spirit, any changes that need to be made will be.  But His mission is not to change me into you, it is to change me into a better me. 

All of my brothers and sisters rejoice in who you are, in who God made you to be.  You are precious to God and He wants to use you.  Use the gifts and abilities He has given to you. 

Don’t waste time trying to be someone else or envying their gifting and wasting yours. 

Love you all

Tags: Fearfully and Wonderfully Made, Identity, Praise, Value, Worth, Writing

Personally, I know that the miraculous, the supernatural, is real and does happen today.  I won’t argue with you or really even try to convince you of this.  Why?  Because it seems that for some Christians and definitely for those outside of Christ’s kingdom, it would make no difference.  Most minds are already made up.

But I have my own question about this.  Why are more signs and wonders going on in some third world countries than in the USA, a supposed Christian nation?  This is if the stories are real: and the sources for a lot of them seem to be of unquestionable integrity.  At least in my personal experience they are. 

When I read about the early church I see so much more supernatural activity than we experience today, yet the number of disciples today vastly exceeds those of their time.  What might be called a miracle today?

I think it would be something that happens with absolutely no way for it to be explained in the natural world.  As I said, I know they happen and I know it because, I have experienced them. 

But when I read about the signs and wonders in the bible I notice that they are always succeeded by an increase in the Kingdom of Christ. 

Is that the answer?

If miracles are only given by God to further the gospel, to advance the Kingdom, and we live in a culture that is going to insist on them being false even when there is pretty good evidence of the reality of some of them, might that be why they do not happen more often? 

Sorry about the length of that question. 

And with some of the things that are going on supposedly in the name of Christ, is it any wonder why no one believes?  This simply has to be rebuked, and harshly.  But that is another post.

I was saved because of signs and wonders.  God did a couple of things to me that could not have happened.  At another time, God caused an aneurysm in my wife’s brain to disappear before the specialist could decide on surgery.  But, even when someone is healed such as my wife, it did not convince anyone that they need to serve Christ.  Not even my kids took it as a sign to get right. 

It seems that the answer could be that if no one is going to pay attention, that if God is not going to be glorified and the Kingdom increased, then He is not going to bother.  God help us.

Love you all

Tags: America, Body of Christ, Faith, Holiness, Jesus Christ, Kingdom, Miracles, Pentecostal, Salvation, Signs and Wonders, Supernatural

Our lives can be measured by a number of key events or stages.  All have a beginning and most can be seen to be an ending also.  Some of these are totally out of our control and some we can control to some extent. 

Conception is where each one of us began.  God only created two as far as we can tell.  After that He asked us to share in His plan by being fruitful.  Since that command the population has depended on procreation.  There is not one person alive that was not conceived by a man and a woman.  Our lives began there and we can say with assurance that there was not an ending of anything.  Unless we try to say it was an end to our nonexistence.  Which I think is rather absurd.  So we can call this The Beginning.

Birth is another and the very next beginning for all of us.  Our mothers carried us all through the first stages of life and then when the time came for us to be born, we entered into another stage.  Birth can be called an ending in the sense that we had to leave the perfect nurturing embrace of the womb and enter the cold hard world we live in.  But for most it isn’t too bad.  A lot of people who came before are there, to love and embrace us, and keep us safe.  Birth is both a beginning and an ending.

School is the next major beginning for most of us.  We come to that place in time where we must start our preparation for what is to come.  We do that by leaving our homes and going off for the first time alone.  So we can learn what society believes we need to know.  Some of us never finish school.  Some of us seem to never want to finish school.  But we all have to move on at some time. 

Work.  Entering the workforce is the next beginning point that we can measure.  It is an ending of the time where we were basically as free as we would ever be.  We now take on real life responsibilities.  All of those teens who just wanted school to end will now be able to see that they had it made.  Work is the thing that most of us will do for the majority of the time we live on this earth. 

Marriage is another major beginning.  It might not fall in this order.  Some marry in school.  And although it may be very rare, some even get married after they retire.  Marriage is one of the best beginnings.  A lot of people joke about it and a lot of people don’t make it all the way through.  But almost all of us really want someone to share this life with.  It is the way God made us.  If it is going to work it should be an ending to our selfishness.  We must give ourselves to the one we marry.

Parenthood is a beginning for most people.  It is not for everyone but it is a very important stage in life.  We not only finally get to share creative power with God; we also get to share in the love for those who are so much less than us.  At least to start.  If it is not, it should be an ending to our own immaturity.  We may have finished school, gotten a job and gotten married, and still be babies ourselves.  But if we want to be the parents we should be, we need to grow up.

Retirement is next if we make it that far.  We finally get to stop working and live out our remaining years in a somewhat less demanding structure.  But it is an end to the bustling world of deadlines and meetings, stress and tiredness, and some just can’t do without it.  At a time when we should be at rest some find only boredom and anxiousness. It is very much an ending as well as a beginning.   

Death is the next beginning.  And it is the best of all.  Some of you may look at it as only an ending, an ending to life.  Some may see that it is not just an ending but is also a beginning.  But do you really see it as the greatest beginning of all? 

2Co 5:1  For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.

2Co 5:2  For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling,

2Co 5:3  if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked.

2Co 5:4  For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened–not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life.

2Co 5:5  He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee.

2Co 5:6  So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord,

2Co 5:7  for we walk by faith, not by sight.

2Co 5:8  Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord.

While we are at home in this body we are away from the Lord. Death is the doorway we go through that allows us to leave behind all the beginnings and endings and spend eternity with the only one who has no beginning or ending, the Alpha and the Omega. 

When we were conceived we were doomed to a pretty rotten future.  But God made us a way through Jesus Christ to achieve that most glorious of all beginnings.  We call it death but God calls it homecoming

Love you all. 

Tags: Beginning, Conception, Death, Ending, Faith, God, Hope, Love, Marriage, Parenthood, Retirement, School, Work