Stories and other stuff

  4  “And now, O Israel, listen to  w the statutes and the rules 1  that I am teaching you, and do them,  x that you may live, and go in and take possession of the land that the  Lord , the God of your fathers, is giving you.  2  y You shall not add to the word that I command you, nor take from it, that you may keep the commandments of the  Lord  your God that I command you.  Deuteronomy 4:1-2 (ESV) I tell people from time to time that I get opportunities to serve God.  One is through my job.  Other times, I get to teach God's word to help people new to it to understand it.  God has blessed me with opportunities to bring a message on Sunday mornings.  I enjoy that because I like to write and I get to learn things about His word, or sometimes a new concept I hadn't fully understood.   I'm careful to be careful with the Word because it's very easy to take things out of context to prove a point especially ...

 I typically don't comment on posts about religion, and almost never (sometimes I do and then have to use the delete key) comment on political posts on Facebook.  The Gospel message is offensive enough.  Sometimes, though, you just gotta. The post in question took two Scriptures out of context to suggest that one could lose one's salvation.  I know some people believe that, but the argument this woman was making using these two scriptures was just plain wrong because in the context they were written, they pointed out to anything but... When someone uses a Scripture verse on its' own....me, or anybody else, everyone who reads it should go back and read the 20 verses before it and the 20 verses after it to gather the context in which the verse is used to see if it was used correctly.  If I don't, call me out.  Please.  I don't ever want to use God's word to be right.  I want to be right in using God's word for its' intended purpose. The other thing ...

Today's verse of the day on the Bible app I use on my phone was "Love the Lord Your God with all your heart, all your mind, and all your strength."  Some days I have to stop and ask myself if I'm really doing that or am I kind of putting me first in some areas. To he honest, I think I sometimes get busier than I ought and let my mind wander.  I spend time thinking about things not above, and it sometimes causes me to not take the best advantage of quiet time with God. I've been thinking about how we, as humans, do that.  We get ahead of our skis and forget how important that quiet time, that time spent with God, reading His word, speaking to Him in prayer, and just having those bonding moments is to our day.  And sometimes, honestly, I let busy get in the way of things God has asked me to do and I forget to do them in a timely manner because I don't make them a real priority. Thankfully, the Holy Spirit is here to remind me of those things and to work with me ...

 Much in the news these days about lies and truth.  I don't often comment on politics and today's not going to be an exception.  I am going to comment on court case though.   My son and I often engage in conversation about current events.  While we don't agree on a lot of things, we are able to have conversations about them in reasonable ways.  Sometimes we learn something we didn't know when we have them.  Sometimes, I can tell by a phrase he uses who in his sphere of influence.  When the company Dominion sued everybody who was spreading what they claimed as false information for defamation, I told my son to keep an eye on this court case because the truth was gonna come out of it. Each person they sued is entitled to a process known as "discovery".  And Dominion is entitled to their own "discovery", and it appears that they've discovered quite a bit.  And a bit of what they've discovered is that people other people really trusted ...

A certain ruler asked him, “Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” “Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone. Luke 18:18-19(NIV)   A well meaning friend who is a believer called me a good man the other day. I appreciated the compliment and I told him so but I also reminded him that no, I'm not a good man. I also told him that I'm a better man than I used to be.   This very topic came up this morning and I brought up the problem with this particular compliment. It's a sentiment used a lot in appreciation of the good things someone does for us, but the good things we do, they do not make us good people. I reminded the folks there that we're not using a right standard for that kind of judgment. I also pointed out that if we accept that kind of praise, in a literal interpretation of Jesus' own words, we are placing ourselves on par with God, without even realizing, nor meaning to.   I do take that literally. And...

I don't know where the time goes these days. It seems like I just forget to write a blog post, then I forget again, and before I know it, a week has gone by. What a week it's been, though. I have never been more busy in my life than I am these days. It's busy with good things, but busy nonetheless. Busy with doing things God has for me to do, but it seems like even in that, finding time to work a 10 hour a week part time job is becoming a struggle because of scheduling. That's a good thing because I work at my church as the custodian. I try to be there when other people aren't and that's sometines hard to do. And then, this week, I just feel like I live in a snow globe and someone just gave it a bit of a shake. James 4:13-15 says: 13 Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” 14 Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a m...