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is your bible old hat?

6/16/2019

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      Is Your Bible Old Hat?
My people are destroyed for lack of kn
owledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children (Hosea 4:6)
 
THE BOOK OF HOSEA SHOULD BE READ and devoured by everyone. One of the biggest dangers in living the Christian life is drifting away from our first love and a weakening down of the Word of God in our hearts.
 
THE APOSTLE JOHN INCLUDES THAT SUBJECT in the book of Revelation: Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee, because thou hast left thy first love.  (Revelation 2:4) If we drift away from our first love, we have lost our vital immunity against sin and it will be easier to sin against God.
 
ISAIAH COMPLAINED THAT ISRAEL HAD A HEART PROBLEM, an attitude problem: Wherefore the Lord said, Forasmuch as this people draw near me with their mouth, and with their lips do honour me, but have removed their heart far from me, and their fear toward me is taught by the precept of men:  (Isaiah 29:13)

THEY HAD AN ARTIFICIAL FEAR OF GOD. Their so-called “fear of God” was not an inward thing. Their “fear of God” was a set of words that talked about the fear of God. These words were taught to them by human teachers. Their condition was fake; a smokescreen.
 
McGEE COMMENTS: “If you had lived in Isaiah's day, you would have wondered what Isaiah really meant, because the people were going to the temple. It was crowded—anytime a sacrifice was offered you would find people there. There was a place for the men, a court for the women, and a court for the Gentiles. Why was God finding fault with these people?

“THEY WERE ALL COMING TO CHURCH, but they went through all of the ritual with their mouths. It was as if they could say the Lord's Prayer and the Apostles' Creed, but it did not mean anything to them. They did not believe what they were saying; they did not accept God's Word. God said that their hearts were far from Him. That is the reason He judged them, and that is the reason He is going to judge us today.”

JESUS TALKED ABOUT THE WORDS OF ISAIAH: Ye hypocrites, well did Esaias prophesy of you, saying,  This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoureth me with their lips; but their heart is far from me. But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men. (Matthew 15:7-9)

"IN HOSEA'S DAY THERE A LACK OF KNOWLEDGE OF THE WORD OF GOD. My friend, if you are a Christian, the minute you get away from the Word of God, you are doomed to failure in the Christian life. Regardless of the number of conferences or seminars you attend that tell you how to be a success in your home, in your business, and in your social life, you will be a failure. This book makes it crystal-clear that we do not live the Christian life by these little gimmicks and methods, but by a personal knowledge of the Word of God. This is the reason I am concerned with teaching the Word of God—and the reason I teach even the Book of Hosea. People are destroyed for lack of knowledge.

"SEEING THOU HAST FORGOTTEN THE LAW OF THY GOD, I will also forget thy children." God says to the people of this nation, "I will forget you, because you have forgotten Me." Because they have gone through a long, sordid history of departing from the Lord, they have now come to the time of judgment. God has proved His case against these people; in the beginning of the chapter He enumerated their sins—they have broken the Ten Commandments. Therefore, He hands down His decision that He is going to judge them.” (McGee-Abbreviated).

THE VERSES AND COMMENTARY ABOVE are offensive to people who have pushed God away. I read this for the first time when I was about 19. Truth is, I skimmed through it because I was hurrying to get through with it…so I could close the Bible and do something else I wanted to do a lot more than I wanted to read the Bible. When the heart is cold, the Bible can be a dead book…even to a Christian. But, this verse in Hosea grabbed my back bumper and stopped me in my tracks!

TO ME, IT SEEMED UNFAIR THAT GOD WOULD ALLOW HIS PEOPLE to be destroyed just because they didn’t know some things. But after I read it several times, I saw that I had misread it. That’s the problem with half-hearted speed reading of the Word of God. You may not get it. It wasn’t that they simply didn’t know something, but that they were actively rejecting the word of God. They were about as deep as a saucer. They didn’t know. They didn’t want to know. They had no intention of knowing.

THEY WERE RESISTING AND REJECTING EVERY EFFORT GOD WAS MAKING to help them know they were going to be destroyed, and why. Some people have a Bible in the house and a pile magazines on top of it so something else will always be read first and the Bible will never be found under the stack…is that going on at your house? It’s dangerous to join up with the pack of rebels of Hosea 4:6 who were bored with the Word of God.

WHEN GOD SAYS SOMETHING WILL DESTROY YOU, IT MAKES GOOD SENSE to pay attention to it. A lot of people who call themselves Christian are playing a game with God in their house. They are broad-minded, progressive…and busy! Walking under the shadow of the Almighty is serious business and ought not to be neglected.

He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.  I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust.  (Psalm 91:1-2)

NO ONE LOVES YOU LIKE GOD. No one will ever love you like God loves you. He wants you to love Him enough to seek His face and walk with Him and obey Him…with all your heart. Ω


 Read Through the Bible in a Year
 June 17, 2019 – MONDAY
A.M.  Ezra 6-8   P.M. John 21
(Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)
 
Great Memory Verse:
Thy word have I hid in mine heart, that I might not sin against thee.  (Psalm 119:11)
    
Songs for Today:
Thy Word Have I Hid -  (Cedarmont Kids) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8UuMu1tzzN4
                   
Near to the heart of God (Mennonite choir)  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UnFNHWJ0tA&list=RD2UnFNHWJ0tA           
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my daddy the sawmiller

6/13/2019

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​                    My Daddy the Saw-Miller     
And he (John the Baptist) shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.  (Luke 1:17)
 
THIS SUNDAY IS "FATHER'S DAY" in the United States. It is a day to pay tribute to our fathers, living and dead, who occupy such an important place in our lives. I always think of the old Jewish priest, Zacharias, who became a father in his old age and how important he was to the nation of Israel.
 
ZACHARIAH, THE PRIEST, AND ELIZABETH were now too old to have a child, so they thought, but God had other plans. He and Elizabeth were going to have a special child, a preacher with the power of the prophet Elijah. His powerful preaching would prepare the hearts of the people for the coming of the promised Jewish Messiah.
 
ONE SPECIAL FEATURE OF HIS PREACHING was that it would turn the hearts of the fathers toward their children. That seems to be a need in every generation. Any nation that has weak fathers is going to be afflicted with moral weakness. The moral decline of America is largely the result of weak fathers who have not modeled the Word of God for their children.
 
FACEBOOK IS ALWAYS FILLED WITH PICTURES OF FATHERS and words of affection and appreciation and we scan through the pictures and comments and enjoy it very much!
I thought it would be good if I join in the recall of fathers and share some memories of my father in Morning Minute.
 
THE PICTURE IS OF MY FATHER and me in 1942 at my dad’s Dogwood mill in Mountain City, TN. I know my mother didn’t take this picture because my collar is too messed up. My dad was forty-four, I was eight and our nation was entering World War II at full speed. One of the highlights of our private life was my going with him on trips. I sat in his lap and steered the car. Mile after mile. He always trusted me to do stuff.
 
Dad professed to be a Christian at that time but was more of a token church attender. He got that settled a few years later. My brother was ten years older and I was “the baby” so I got a lot of attention and more coddling than my brother. My dad was a go-getter in his sawmilling. His products had to be “right.” He bought his first Dogwood mill when he was sixteen and hired his sister, Stella, to fire the boiler that powered the mill. He later had lumber mills, too. But the Great Depression stopped all building and he went bankrupt with a yard full of lumber on hand.
 
That was the last lumber he cut and switched over to Dogwood and Hickory products for the weaving industry, tool handles, skis. The U.S. military was desperate to produce uniforms, tents, parachutes, etc. and the weaving industry depended on dogwood sawmills to produce weaving shuttles and hickory mills to make the batting (picker) sticks for the shuttles.
 
My dad never laid his hand on me in discipline. His sternest words were: “Well, I’d be ashamed!” My mother was a little more emphatic with a peach tree switch. Dad (and Mother) finished the eighth grade back when the eighth grade was full of useful stuff. He was good with a pencil.
 
He realized that in addition to a good sawmill, he needed a good typewriter for correspondence with the mills that finished his Dogwood products. My earliest memories are his new 1935 Royal typewriter and Dad typing with his two fingers. Not bad! He had a pen and a bottle of ink for signing his letters. He sold many truckloads of products with that typewriter; New Hampshire, New York, Greensboro, NC. After the war, he sold products to London and other European countries…with that Royal Typewriter.
 
He saw my interest in the typewriter and when I was five, he turned a chair around and let me stand on my knees and type with two fingers. I was learning my letters off the baking powder and lard cans in the kitchen and learned to spell my name. So, I began typing my name at five. I still have the typewriter and sometimes type Scripture memory cards on it. There’s a company that makes new typewriters and ribbons for the typewriters of the 30’s. I taped the address on the side of the typewriter. When the original cover came apart, he had a heavy leather cover made for it and it’s still in good shape.
 
Dad loved to walk around on the little farm at Crossville, TN, at the Homesteads. But he never put his hands in the dirt or use a hoe or milk a cow or goat or feed a pig or gather eggs. That was my mother’s domain, and mine after I reached twelve.
 
We had a smoke house that dad had repaired, poured a concrete floor, and made it into his office. He loved the Chuck Wagon Gang and had a collection of their records he played in his office. When I was grown and would visit, we always went to his office and he played the Chuck Wagon Gang and the Carter Family.
 
He visited us one time but didn’t spend the night. He was big on luring us to his house and he always wanted to give me some gas money because he didn’t visit us. So, that’s the way we did it.
 
I didn’t get it all together until Dad was gone and I slowly reassembled it into one big picture. He had a drive and determination that few men had. He didn’t know it couldn’t be done. He loved his family. I watched him grow closer to the Lord in his last years. I wouldn’t trade him for any other dad. Ω

Read Through the Bible in a Year
June 14, 2019 – FRIDAY
A.M.  Ezra 6-8   P.M. John 21
(Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)
 
Great Memory Verses:
Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance. The LORD looketh from heaven; he beholdeth all the sons of men.  (Psalm 33:12-13)
            
 Song for Today:
Precious Memories (5:56) (Jim Hill - Gaither Group)
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nP05xuYv708
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the christian tongue

6/12/2019

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                The Christian Tongue…      
Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers. And grieve not the holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption. Let all bitterness, and wrath, and anger, and clamour, and evil speaking, be put away from you, with all malice:  (Ephesians 4:29-31)

OUR MOUTH, OUR TONGUE, is where we live. Notice that “corrupt communication” comes just before “grieve not the holy Spirit of God.”

DOES ANYTHING CAUSE MORE TROUBLE AMONG PEOPLE THAN THE MOUTH? And, when we become Christians, an uncontrolled mouth and tongue is even more out of place. Jesus always had control of His tongue, even when He was standing on trial for His life before the Roman Governor, Pilate. The High Priest asked Jesus if He had nothing to say. Then, Pilate joined the priest: And Pilate asked him again, saying, Answerest thou nothing? behold how many things they witness against thee.  (Mark 15:4)

I’M AFRAID I WOULD HAVE LOST IT. My temper is not in my closet. My temper is in my tongue! It’s a given that, “your dirt is dirtier than my dirt.” “Your words are worse than my words.” We know that alcohol and drugs break up a lot of homes, but I have longed believed that an unruly tongue has broken up more homes than alcohol. Since the beginning of the human race, mankind has struggled to live with his tongue and especially the tongues of those around him. A lot of people have met an early death because of somebody’s unruly tongue.
 
WHEN I WAS LOOKING FOR A PICTURE FOR THIS ARTICLE on Google Images, it took me a long while to find what I was looking for. At least 90% of Google’s pictures of mouths are of women. I couldn’t figure that out. (I probably should not have mentioned it.) It is true that men tend to hold it in and won’t talk to their wives and it drives their wives up a wall. But here is the picture of a man, clean-shaven, in the act of talking. You can see intensity in the shape of his mouth. He’s not mumbling. He’s not whispering! (He may be preaching?)

IN MY TEENS, I found this verse that has blessed me many times: A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver.  (Proverbs 25:11) And this verse: The Lord GOD hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary:…  (Isaiah 50:4a)
 
BUT, HOW OFTEN HAVE I SAID THINGS, that before they were out of my mouth, I knew it was a raw egg in the floor? You remember how it feels for that one split second when you see the egg roll off the cabinet and the next stop is the floor? It’s not a cooked egg that lands with a thud. It’s a raw egg that lands with a splat! Sometimes words are like that.

“I DIDN'T MEAN THAT!" But you said it. You just blurted it out. It’s a raw egg on the floor. Jesus’ half-brother, James, was nick-named “Camel Knee James” because he prayed so much he had callouses on his knees like a camel. Type in “camel knee James” on Google and see how many responses you get. I did it and got back 15,400,000 responses in one second. (Fifteen million, four hundred thousand.) This James wrote: For in many things we offend all. If any man offend not in word, the same is a perfect man, and able also to bridle the whole body.  (James 3:2)

DO YOU SEE WHAT THIS MAN IS SAYING? He had noticed that many things offended people in his day. But the hardest thing was the use of the tongue…mouth management. It really bothered him. He continued:

Behold, we put bits in the horses' mouths, that they may obey us; and we turn about their whole body.  Behold also the ships, which though they be so great, and are driven of fierce winds, yet are they turned about with a very small helm, whithersoever the governor listeth.
 
Even so the tongue is a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth! And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity: so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell.
 
For every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind:  But the tongue can no man tame; it is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison.  (James 3:3-8)

THE PSALMIST COMMENTED ON THE PEOPLE OF HIS DAY: …Who have said, with our tongue will we prevail; our lips are our own: who is lord over us?  (Psalm 12:4)

Is there any greater need in Christian testimony than a dedicated, Christian tongue? Ω

Read Through the Bible in a Year
June 13, 2019 – THURSDAY
A.M.  Ezra 3-5   P.M. John 20
(Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)
 
Great Memory Verses:
Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance. The LORD looketh from heaven; he beholdeth all the sons of men.  (Psalm 33:12-13)
            
Song for Today:
There Is a Fountain (4:39) (Gaither Group)
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PasK3ZFAOPE
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two mules and a pile of dirt...

6/10/2019

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        Two Mules and a Pile of Dirt…   
And Naaman said, Shall there not then, I pray thee, be given to thy servant two mules' burden of earth? for thy servant will henceforth offer neither burnt offering nor sacrifice unto other gods, but unto the LORD. (2 Kings 5:17)
 
READING THE BIBLE AT A RAPID PACE has its place but not in these verses. “We can’t dig taters while we’re running through the garden.” Let’s review the story.

NAAMAN, THE TOP MILITARY GENERAL OF ASSYRIA, (100 miles or so northeast of Israel) has come to Israel on the strength of the testimony of a little captive slave girl in his house, stolen from her Jewish home somewhere along the northern border of Israel.  This little girl had the noble soul of a queen and loved him enough to tell his wife about a prophet of God in Israel that could heal his leprosy. Naaman was marked for a slow and painful death that had no respect for his greatness in perhaps the strongest nation on earth at the time.

HE GOES TO ISRAEL AND GETS A GENUINE PUT-DOWN FROM THE PROPHET OF GOD who wouldn’t even come to the front door of his house to greet this noble Assyrian general. He is told to go and “wash” in the muddy river of Jordan, dip himself under the water seven times and he would be healed.

THE JORDAN RIVER WAS MUDDY, but he had to get God’s help on God’s terms. God will have nothing to do with a proud man. Naaman’s pride was as bad as his leprosy. He finally humbles his heart and at the advice of his servants, obeys the stern old prophet.

NAAMAN IS HEALED ON THE SPOT! HEALED IN THE MUDDY RIVER!  Now, he doesn’t know what to do. He is a new man! He is full of joy! He wants to give something to the old prophet. His “sons of the prophets” could certainly use the money to buy food and clothing. But Elisha won’t have it. He will not have a high-level Assyrian thinking he can “buy God.”

NAAMAN THINKS ABOUT TOMORROW. “An altar!” “I’ve got to have some holy ground! This old prophet lives on holy ground. I’ve got to have some holy ground from the prophet’s house!” If he couldn’t live in Israel and pray to Israel’s God from the land of Israel, he would take a little pile of Israel’s dirt with him. He could build a box around it; and make an altar he could see, or he could scatter the dirt inside a circle and kneel on that dirt.

LET'S LOOK AT SOMETHING. God called on Moses and got his attention with a burning bush that kept on burning. When Moses came over to check it out, the bush talked to him!
And he (God) said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.  (Exodus 3:5)

LATER WHEN MOSES WAS DEAD AND JOSHUA HAD TAKEN HIS PLACE and was about to invade the Promised Land, a stranger showed up and introduced himself as the new “Captain of the LORD”S host.”  And he added immediately: Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so.  (Joshua 5:15)

JOSHUA MUST HAVE AGREED THAT IT WAS HOLY GROUND or else he would not have taken off his shoes. Joshua was not a kindergarten student! He was a seasoned warrior and trained for many years by old Moses and had a depth of knowledge of God that few men had. He knew enough about the holy ground thing to immediately take off his shoes! Some people might write this off as too silly to be serious about it. “

NO HOLY GROUND? Well, we don’t worship the ground we revere but if God met you on a certain spot, you’re going to think more of that spot than any other place on earth. I still remember the spot where God met with me in the bean market in October 1943. The bean market has been gone 50 years, but the holy ground is still in my mind and heart. We would do well to have some holy ground.

NAAMAN WOULD SERVE NO OTHER GOD BUT HE GOD OF ISRAEL. But he had to go home to Damascus (the oldest continually inhabited city in the world) and pick up where he left off. He could not force the King of Assyria to worship the God of Israel. He would have to go with his boss and put up a front about the god of Damascus: Hadad-Rimmon, a god of rain and thunder, shortened to Rimmon.

IT WAS HIS DUTY O GO WITH THE KING AND OTHER OFFICIALS OF STATE. Naaman was a new believer with no background and was not ready to risk his life by balking against the King. He was not like Daniel and his three friends (Daniel. 3:12) who refused to bow to the gods of Babylon. He was not as responsible as an Israelite trained in the Word of God.

GOD TOLD ISRAEL WHAT TO DO ABOUT BUILDING ALTARS. Ye shall not make with me gods of silver, neither shall ye make unto you gods of gold. An altar of earth thou shalt make unto me, and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings, and thy peace offerings, thy sheep, and thine oxen: in all places where I record my name I will come unto thee, and I will bless thee.  And if thou wilt make me an altar of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone: for if thou lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it.  (Exodus 20:23-25)

JOSHUA REMEMBERED THIS WHEN HE LATER BUILT AN ALTAR: Then Joshua built an altar unto the LORD God of Israel in mount Ebal, As Moses the servant of the LORD commanded the children of Israel, as it is written in the book of the law of Moses, an altar of whole stones, over which no man hath lift up any iron: and they offered thereon burnt offerings unto the LORD, and sacrificed peace offerings.  (Joshua 8:30-31)

THE ROCK THAT FOLLOWED ISRAEL IN THE WILDERNESS WAS CHRIST (1Corinthians.10:4). He was the stone which the builders rejected. We must have the Christ of the Bible, the Rock of the Bible. That rock must remain unchanged, unaltered to suit ourselves.
 
TWO MULES AND A PILE OF DIRT DISPLAYS THE NEED FOR A SPECIAL, DAILY MEETING place with God. Jesus had such a place: And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed.  (Mark 1:35) He didn’t pray every day at that same place since he did a lot of traveling. But we may be assured that He regularly found a solitary place and prayed. Ω

                Do you need to share today’s message with someone?
 
Read Through the Bible in a Year  
 JUNE 11, 2019 – TUESDAY      
A.M.  2Chronicles: 34-36      P.M.  John 19:1-22
 (Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)
 
Good Verse to Memorize:
Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance. The LORD looketh from heaven; he beholdeth all the sons of men.  (Psalm 33:12-13)
 
Song for Today:
Holy, Holy, Holy (6:38) (John Starnes & Choir -FBC-Jax, Fla.)
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P-rdFR9pgvo
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wartime praying

6/9/2019

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           Wartime Praying      

And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart. (Jeremiah 29:13)
 
ON THE NIGHT OF JUNE 6, 1944, President Roosevelt went on national radio to address the nation for the first time about the Normandy invasion that had begun that morning at 6:30 a.m. This is the most complete version of the broadcast that I could find. You will want to listen to it and play it for your family….because…..
 
ON THAT EVENING, MANY THOUSANDS OF FAMILIES hovered around their radios…all across America to hear his address, which included a prayer for the men involved in the invasion. I hope the link works for you. It should bring up a picture of President Roosevelt behind several microphones. On the screen is a blue block with a white arrow in it. Click the arrow. A commercial will come on. Wait for the commercial to finish.
 
THIS IS THE COMPLETE PRAYER and I think it is important that we review it.  On the evening of the broadcast, American newspapers had printed the President’s speech and prayer. This gave the greatest possible exposure of the prayer to all Americans. The comments made by the announcer are helpful in understanding the broadcast.
 
https://www.msnbc.com/morning-joe/watch/remembering-roosevelt-s-d-day-prayer-61413957977

ONE OF THE PRINTED BIOGRAPHIES OF GENERAL DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER, Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces, reveals that on the night before the invasion, he spent most of the night in prayer. He paced back and forth in his room, praying to the God of Heaven to help the men in the Allied Armies who were going into the biggest battle in the history of the world.

AFTER THE INVASION WAS UNDERWAY, people did much praying; individually, in homes, churches, schools, factories and in small groups of all kinds. At the Flatrock Baptist-Methodist church in Flat Rock, AL, the women of the community met weekly at the church to pray for the safety and success of the men fighting the war. They gathered at the altar of the church and prayed earnestly on their knees. All over America, this was going on. Prayer meetings everywhere.

I WAS SAVED IN OCTOBER 1943 IN A MEETING IN A COMMERCIAL BEAN MARKET in the middle of the war. The bean growing season was over when frost came, and the big bean market building was available for a meeting. The market was filled with people every night. I was nine years old and my mother let me go by myself to the meeting every night. Churches filled up during the war.

SIXTEEN MILLION+ AMERICAN MEN AND WOMEN WERE IN UNIFORM. All males 18 years old and up were required to register for the draft. Every county had a Draft Board. The nation was in a very patriotic mood, a fighting mood, and in a mood to pray. The Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor on Sunday, December 7, 1941 galvanized the soul of America in one day.

THERE WAS A GREAT SURGE OF YOUNG MEN volunteering the next week for military service.
 
AFTER THE WAR, MANY STORIES WERE TOLD ABOUT STRANGE THINGS that happened that allowed some men to escape death. Books and magazine articles were printed about these incidents. It is important that we know about wartime praying. How much do we need to pray today for our country, seeing we are so divided? Ω

Read Through the Bible in a Year  
 JUNE 10, 2019 – MONDAY      
A.M.  2Chronicles: 32-33      P.M.  John 18:24-40
 (Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)

Memory Verse This Month:
Blessed is the nation whose God is the LORD; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance. The LORD looketh from heaven; he beholdeth all the sons of men.  (Psalm 33:12-13)
 
Song for Today:
Battle Hymn of the Republic (5:18) – (The United States Army Field Band)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jy6AOGRsR80
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The pictures on the wall

6/7/2019

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    The Pictures on the Wall    
Now when Jesus was in Bethany, in the house of Simon the leper,  There came unto him a woman having an alabaster box of very precious ointment, and poured it on his head, as he sat at meat. (Matthew 26:6-7)

Verily I say unto you, Wheresoever this gospel shall be preached in the whole world, there shall also this, that this woman hath done, be told for a memorial of her.  (Matthew 26:13)

“MEMORIAL" IS FOUND 32 TIMES IN THE KING JAMES BIBLE.times in the King James Bible. It is a good word. Some things ought to be remembered. Around the world, people have buried their dead and if they can afford it, have placed a stone memorial with the name, birth and death dates of the deceased. Is it too much that we fragile human beings might want to be accorded this tiny bit of significance…a stone with our name and date etched into the stone?

WHEN GRAVE MARKERS ARE VANDALIZED BY HOODLUMS, it raises the wrath among other human beings who do not know anyone in the cemetery. There’s something in us that recoils against anyone who lacks this tiny bit of respect for another human being.

THIS YEAR  (JANUARY 2019) THE STATE OF WASHINGTON had a bill to be introduced that would legalize the composting of human bodies to be used as fertilizer for flowers or whatever the family might want to use it for. For whatever reason one might want to do this, it must be admitted that it is a step away from being remembered by any future generation. It runs away from the idea of human significance, even if it’s no more than a chisel mark on a stone. Is that too much recognition of human significance?

AT ODDS WITH THAT BIZARRE IDEA, INDIANA AND OHIO have recently passed laws requiring aborted babies to be buried or cremated. This is in keeping with the time-honored practice of burying human bodies as a matter of respect of the dignity of human life. “The sanctity of human life,” we call it.  The U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the Indiana law. If you want to read further, Google will help you find the details.

EVEN MORE STRUCTURED IS THE LONG-TIME PRACTICE of the American military respecting their own who are killed in battle. “No one left behind” has become part of a deep-seated commitment. Someone made a movie: “Saving Private Ryan,” a vivid display of this family-comradery principle. It runs through the nerve and psyche of the soldier. “We go in together and we come out together.” “Either we walk out, or we will be carried out on a stretcher.” Americans didn’t invent it. The Romans included it in the training of their soldiers, and they wrote it in Latin. It is a powerful tool in bonding soldiers together.

IN RECENT YEARS SOME WOUNDED AMERICAN SOLDIERS SAY THEY ARE MOTIVATED to heal their wounds so they can get back to their units to help them succeed and be safe. That’s what they say to news journalists. Some feel guilty because they survived an attack that killed some of their companions.

THE APOSTLE PAUL KNEW ABOUT THE ROMAN SOLDIER COMRADERY:  Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life; that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier.  (2Timothy 2:3-4)
 
MY CHILDHOOD EXPERIENCES OF MINGLING WITH AMERICAN SOLDIERS during World War 2, were so strong that it shaped me for life. Gasoline and tires were rationed, so we  traveled a lot on trains and buses that were often full of soldiers going home or coming from home or on their way to the battle zones. Homes that had a big star posted in a window had someone in service, and stars were everywhere. I worked in a drugstore as a soda-jerk because there was no one bigger to do it. There were no high school graduates around. It was 1943. Summer had arrived.
 
I COULD BARELY REACH THE COUNTER WITHOUT SPILLING COKE ON SOMEONE, so, in my 8th year I stood on my toes and stretched to reach the counter. In summer I could make $7.00 a week. I developed strong hands and wrists dipping ice cream. Mixed in with that were the telegrams. A few weeks earlier, in the Spring, my 3rd grade teacher’s fiance’ was missing in action and she was crying in class. Telegrams were dreaded.
 
THE DRUG STORE IN MOUNTAIN CITY, TN, WAS ALSO THE BUS STATION. Soldiers were coming and going. And then, one day, a Jeep with a tall radio aerial passed our door and parked up the street. Soldiers jumped out of the Jeep and took over directing traffic. In a couple of minutes, a long convoy of trucks carrying troops, artillery pieces and tanks began passing through and turning left at the traffic light.

THEY WERE FROM FORT BRAGG, NC AND WERE PRACTICING DRIVING THROUGH our Blue Ridge Mountain of narrow, winding roads before moving men and machines through the Black Forest of Germany. Of course, they must first go by ship to the beaches of Normandy and if they lived through it, they would go through the mountainous terrain in Germany. For several days, convoy after convoy came through our town. We were amazed and could only guess what it meant. This continued off and on for months.

 FAST-FORWARD FIFTEEN YEARS and as a church pastor, I was working hard at visiting hospitals, homes, shut-ins and inviting people to church. In those days, a lot of wives and mothers were still at home. So, when I knocked on a front door, about half the time, someone would be home.

IN VISITING STRANGERS, YOU NEED SOMETHING TO TALK ABOUT. I noticed that most people had pictures on the walls of their living rooms and maybe on a little table here and there. “Who is that in the picture?” People were eager to talk about their pictures and tell me all about the “picture people,” and where they lived…or where they were buried.

AMONG THE PICTURES was often a soldier in a military uniform, and sometimes several soldiers. Many of the men in uniform had made it home and were working. But, some of them didn’t make it home and the folks of that home needed someone to listen; to let them pour out their hearts.

SOME OF THE PICTURES ON THE WALL were very young men, 18-20 years old and had never married. Some had married and had left a wife and child, or children. Of course, in many homes the “soldier” pictures were not on display but carefully preserved in albums where they could be opened and shared on special occasions.

AS YEARS PASSED AND I CONTINUED TO VISIT HOMES, I noticed that the soldiers on the wall stayed there. They were still part of the family, though they had faded to the background. Sometimes a mother might say to me, “Susan is going to graduate from high school soon. Her daddy would have enjoyed seeing her graduate. Maybe he’ll be watching.”

THE PICTURES ON THE WALL BECAME PART OF THE CHURCH, part of the community. Today, 75 years later, some of those pictures are still on the wall. On Veteran’s Day or Decoration Day, churches encourage families to bring pictures for a display at church. Time is allotted to let everyone talk about their daddy, brother, grandpa. And, we all have seen the display that occurs on Face Book.

WE NOW HAVE ADDED PICTURES FROM MORE RECENT WARS, and from community tragedies, new types of heroes are emerging. We owe a lot to our veterans and to our law enforcement officers, firemen, and first responders who are now giving their lives to make America safe. “Jesus died for the saving of our souls. Many of our veterans have died to make us free.” “If you can read, thank a teacher. If you can read in English, thank an American soldier.”
 
Read Through the Bible in a Year  
 JUNE 7, 2019 – FRIDAY      
A.M.  2Chronicles: 23-25      P.M.  John 16:16-33
 (Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)

Memory Verse This Month:
Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer.  (Psalm 19:14)

Song for Today:
Battle Hymn of the Republic (5:18) – (The United States Army Field Band)(Written by Julia Ward Howe in 1862, in the midst of the Civil War.) She wrote the words and fitted them to the tune of “John Brown’s Body.”  Originally written in a northern setting, it has become a national proclamation of the soul of the nation. In the Civil War, (1860-65) 622,000 lives were lost. WW2 (1941-45) took the lives of 291,000 American soldiers. Only recently has the total deaths of all other wars exceeded the deaths of the Civil War.

INCLUDED ARE THE WORDS: ”In the beauty of the lilies, Christ was born across the sea, with a glory in his bosom that transfigures you and me; as he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free, as we go marching on.” This performance by The United States Army Field Band has been reviewed on You Tube 7,495,664 times.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jy6AOGRsR80
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the bible and compound probability

6/4/2019

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         The Bible and Compound Probability
     
We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts:
 
Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.   For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.  (2Peter 1:19-21)

“COMPOUND PROBABILITY.” Google just found it 54 million times in less than one second. Everyone should know “compound probability” like their family name.

COMPOUND PROBABILITY IS: “A compound event is one in which there is more than one possible outcome.” Compound probability is a key element in Bible prophecy. We’ll come back to this later.

I HEARD THE LATE, DR. WALTER WILSON OF KANSAS CITY, MO., medical doctor, tent maker and pastor, say something like this: “God wrote two books. One book, you can hold in your hand and it’s called: The Bible. The other book is the creation of the earth and the vast universe”. You can’t have a watch without a watch maker. Simple.

A FEW YEARS AGO, a few Sunday Morning TV programs were aired by a group of highly rated professors entitled: “In Search of the Real Jesus.”  Their approach was to sift through archaeological diggings and various museum relics for verifying the Jesus of the Bible. That has been the approach of “Higher Criticism” for over a hundred years. One might expect these self-appointed “experts” to agree among themselves about their findings. However, they are broken up into various camps and they can’t agree with each other on the details of proving, by their methods, “Who the real Jesus is.”

WE ALREADY KNOW THE BIBLE TO BE THE WORD OF GOD whether these “learned scholars” find any more significant relics. I would suggest that they are looking in the wrong place. Some of most reliable proofs of Bible trustworthiness is the Bible itself. More in a minute.

WHEN I WAS IN THE SIXTH GRADE, we lived in Elizabethton, TN. Our curriculum in the public school included a study of the Greek gods. I was particularly interested in Thor, the god of thunder, whose name ended up in “Thursday” of our week. (Thor’s day.)

MY THOUGHTS: “These people thought their gods were the true gods. How do I know my God is the true God?” My best, honest reason was that it was what my mother believed, and she was a good woman. That’s the best I could come up with.

FOR SEVERAL YEARS I READ MY BIBLE, attended church, and kept this question in the back of my mind. It was bedrock that the most honest people I knew believed the Bible was the book of the real God.

“ISN'T THE BIBLE AS RELIABLE AS THE GREEK WRITINGS ABOUT THEIR GODS? Why do these public-school textbooks raise the question of “which god” and did not include the Bible as being as reliable as the Greek books of mythology?”
 
YEARS LATER AS I PLOWED THROUGH A THICK COLLEGE PHILOSOPHY TEXTBOOK and listened to one of the smartest men in America teach the class, I learned that the Greek philosophers couldn’t agree with each other. They sifted each other and struggled to come up with something better than the last generation. One generation after another, their best thinkers couldn’t find truth and couldn’t find God. Their gods were defective, and their systems of thought were defective. Philosophy: the love of knowledge.
 
TO STUDY PHILOSOPHY IN COLLEGE IS TO STUDY THE SYSTEMS OF THOUGHT that were considered and then discarded, or superseded. “The previous generation of philosophers worked their lifetime and didn’t get it, but we’ve got it.” The next generation did the same thing. Finally, they had exhausted all the possible ideas and philosophy, as a pursuit of learning, was bankrupt and unprofitable.  The one, true God was looking on and said:
 
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.  For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.  (Isaiah 55:8-9)
 
PAUL WAS THE "BRAIN" AMONG THE CHRISTIANS and commented to the Christians at Corinth: For after that in the wisdom of God the world by wisdom (Greek philosophers, primarily) knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.  (1Corinthians 1:21)
 
GOD WAS WISE ABOVE THEM ALL AND LET THEM EXHAUST THEMSELVES seeking after truth through debate and discussions and writing their books. Then, God was pleased to reveal truth through Divine Revelation. Not through discussion and sifting of the best minds through several generations. God revealed what they could not discover among themselves.

WHEN JESUS WAS ON TRIAL BEFORE PILOT, Jesus said He had come to bear witness of the truth and Pilot immediately asked Him: “What is truth?” (John 18:38) Jesus Himself is the truth, the Word of God in human flesh.

AT LAST, I CAME ACROSS SOME OF THE PROPHETIC STATEMENTS OF THE BIBLEe (see below on this page) and went to the County Fair. At the County Fair, there was the jar of marbles or jellybeans and you could pay to guess how many were in the jar. That would be almost impossible, so, I didn’t waste my money on it. I had never heard of “compound probability.” That’s a little branch of math that deals with the probability of a certain thing being true. The more factors that go into the problem, the less likely you are to come up with the right answer. Guessing a big jar of jelly beans is not good.

MANY YEARS LATER, I WAS TEACHING A HIGH SCHOOL PROPHECY CLASS and we considered what the chances were that Jesus could fulfill the prophesies in the Old Testament concerning Himself. Some math students in Texas had already taken it on as a project and concluded that it was one chance in 1, followed by 80 zeros. I began making zeros on an eight-foot chalk board and found I could draw 40 reasonable-size zeros across the chalk board. So, I had to go across the chalk board twice with zeros. There it was: a one followed by eighty zeroes. I never heard of any state lotteries having that many zeroes, not even a national lottery would have that many zeroes. I can’t comprehend it.

WALTER C.KAISER, JR.WROTE AN ARTICLE: The Promise of the Messiah in Decision Magazine November 22, 2006, in which he says: “In his Encyclopedia of Biblical Prophecy, J. Barton Payne itemized 127 Messianic predictions involving more than 3,000 Bible verses, with a remarkable 574 verses referring directly to a personal Messiah! My book The Messiah in the Old Testament examined 65 direct prophecies about the Messiah. These incredible promises formed one of the most central themes of the Old Testament: the coming Messiah.” https://billygraham.org/decision-magazine/november-2006/the-promise-of-the-messiah/ (Read the whole article.)

KEEP IN MIND THAT MANY OF THE 127 PREDICTIONS HAD MULTIPLE PARTS must come to pass. The Texas students, above, concluded that, altogether, something in excess of 300 separate items had to be fulfilled. Many are yet to be fulfilled. But, enough were fulfilled in Jesus’ lifetime to make an astounding statement by means of compound probability.

EVEN BEFORE I HEARD OF COMPOUND PROBABILITY, I had looked at the element of prophecy in the Bible and knew that I had found something the gods of the Greeks didn’t have. None of the gods of any nation in the history of the world has ever had a proven rate of fulfilled prophecies in its literature. None!

THAT'S WHY I ENJOY WALKING AROUND IN THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS, realizing there’s not one book in that massive national library that can tell the future. Well, there IS one book: there are some Bibles in the Library of Congress. That one book in our largest library tells the most significant things that are going to happen in the future. It also tells where we came from and what our purpose is in being here.

CONSIDER THESE VERSES ON WHAT GOD SAYS ABOUT HIMSELF. 
Behold, the former things are come to pass, and new things do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them.  (Isaiah 42:9)

Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me,  Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure:  (Isaiah 46:9-10)
 
Jesus said: Now I tell you before it come, that, when it is come to pass, ye may believe that I am he.  (John 13:19)
 
Known unto God are all his works from the beginning of the world.  (Act 15:18)

FULFILLED PROPHECY IS ONE OF THE MAIN THINGS that interests me about the trustworthiness of the Bible. There are other reasons, but this is one of the foundational proofs that the Bible is reliable. It would take several months of articles like this to go through all the Bible prophecies and their fulfillment. The Bible contains plenty of proof in its own pages to prove it is what it says it is: The Word of God. Ω
 
Read Through the Bible in a Year  
JUNE 5, 2019 – WEDNESDAY      
A.M.  2Chronicles: 17-19      P.M.  John 15
 (Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)

Memory Verse This Month:
Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer.  (Psalm 19:14)

Song for Today:
Glory to His Name(2:01) – (Male Trio) (Calvary Mem.Church – S.Pines, NC)
https://www.facebook.com/100009410046480/videos/1823831644607153/
 
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break up your fallow ground...

6/3/2019

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                                         Break Up Your Fallow Ground

For thus saith the LORD to the men of Judah and Jerusalem, Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns.  (Jeremiah 4:3)

Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the LORD, till he come and rain righteousness upon you.  (Hosea 10:12)

JEREMIAH AND HOSEA BOTH PREACHED that God’s people should break up their fallow ground. Fallow ground is: “plowed and left unseeded for a season or more; uncultivated.” (Dictionary.com) Israel was instructed by the Lord to let their land go unplowed and unplanted every seventh year. But in the seventh year shall be a sabbath of rest unto the land, a sabbath for the LORD: thou shalt neither sow thy field, nor prune thy vineyard.  (Leviticus 25:4)

JEREMIAH AND HOSEA HAVE BORROWED A METAPHOR from Israel’s farm life to illustrate a spiritual need in the lives of the people. The message is to God’s people who at one time were in touch with Him and need to plow their souls again. This message is strictly to God’s people. It is not about plowing new ground that has never grown crops before. That’s why He specifically called it: fallow ground. God did not harden the hearts of His people. They did that themselves. But He used the fallow ground as an object lesson for them.

LAND THAT HAS NEVER BEEN PLOWED OR HAD CROPS TO GROW ON IT before is not fallow ground. Many pictures like the right one above are portrayed online as fallow ground but it is not fallow ground. This appears to be the dried bottom of a lake that has a high content of clay. That’s why it cracked open. Nothing has been growing on this land and most likely, farm crops would not easily grow on it.

THE MESSAGE IS NOT TO LOST PEOPLE who have never had the seed of the Word of God planted in them. He wants lost people to be saved, but that is not dealt with in this message. God’s people need times of refreshing so that the seed of the Word of God can take root and grow fruit.

McGEE COMMENTS: “This is a principle that runs throughout the Bible. It is exactly what Paul wrote to the believers in Galatia: "Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting" (Galatians 6:7-8). Hosea is saying that if they would sow in righteousness, they would reap in mercy. It is always true that we cannot live by the Devil's standards and then expect to reap a reward from God!"

THIS DOESN'T NEED A LOT OF EXPLAINING TO THOSE WHO HAVE DONE ANY FARMING or gardening. A small amount of clay is desirable in the growing soil, but only a small amount. The roots of plants breath oxygen that is in the loose soil. If too much clay is in the soil, the oxygen level will be low, and the plants will suffocate for lack of root oxygen. It’s the same if it rains too long and the plants begin to turn yellow because they are starved for oxygen at the root level.  Air and breath are words that remind us of the Holy Spirit. Fallow ground shuts out air, shuts out the Holy Spirit.

I WATCHED MY GRANDPA RICHARDS PLOW BETWEEN THE ROWS OF CORN or garden plants, even when there were few weeds. I wondered why he did that.  He didn’t know why, except his father taught him to do it. He was breaking up the crust that had formed on top of the ground after a rain and the crust hindered the input of oxygen into the soil. So, breaking up the soil is a constant need, especially when the plants are small, and the root system is not fully developed. If soil “lays out” for a year, the rains pack the soil and the packed soil hinders the plants just like too much clay in the soil. So, the soil must be broken up.

JESUS DISPLAYED A SIMILAR PRINCIPLE WHEN HE WASHED THE DISCIPLES' FEET and Peter didn’t want Jesus to wash his feet.  Peter saith unto him, Thou shalt never wash my feet. Jesus answered him, If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with me.  Simon Peter saith unto him, Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head.  Jesus saith to him, He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit: and ye are clean, but not all.(Judas needed a complete bath and was not clean at all.)  (John 13:8-10)

JOHN WROTE ABOUT OUR NEED OF CLEANSING, which corresponds to the breaking up of fallow ground. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.  (1John 1:8-10)

PETER WROTE ABOUT THE NEED TO BE STIRRED UP. This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you; in both which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance: That ye may be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us the apostles of the Lord and Saviour:  (2Peter 3:1-2)

MOSES WROTE OF THE LAMPSTAND AND ITS NEED TO BE TRIMMED of its ashes. And the tongs thereof, and the snuffdishes thereof, shall be of pure gold.  Of a talent of pure gold (about 75 pounds of gold) shall he make it, with all these vessels. (Exodus 25:38-39)

BARNES COMMENTS:arnes comments: Exodus 25:38 “The tongs - Used to trim and adjust the wicks. (Compare Isaiah 6:6.) The snuff-dishes - These were shallow vessels used to receive the burnt fragments of wick removed by the tongs. The same Hebrew word is translated, in accordance with its connection, “fire pans,” Exodus 27:3; Exodus 38:3; and “censers,” Numbers 4:14; Numbers 16:6.” (Barnes)

THE TONGS AND BASIN FOR THE ASHES AND WICK TRIMMINGS were made of gold and weighed at least 75 pounds. The gold is a symbol of deity.

TRIMMING THE WICKS AND THE SNUFFERS IN THE TEMPLE. They became corrupted because of their God-appointed use and not because of rebellion and sin.

LIKEWISE, GOD TOLD HIS PEOPLE TO LET THE GROUND LAY OUT, and in that obedience, the ground compacted and needed to be broken up. Again, Jeremiah and Hosea used fallow ground to illustrate what ought to be done in the lives of His people. As we serve God in the line of our appointed duty, we become polluted and hardened in our hearts and need to break up the hardened condition that has come upon us. We need the fresh dew of Heaven upon us.

IN OUR APPOINTED DUTY, OUR FEET BECOME SOILED IN A FALLEN WORLD and we need to wash our feet. After we have spent ourselves and we are reduced to ashes, we need to cast ourselves in our burned-out condition into the presence of God. In our service for God we grow weary and need to be stirred up and refreshed again.

WHEN ELIJAH CALLED DOWN FIRE FROM HEAVEN upon the sacrifice and altar on Mount Carmel, he ran ahead of Ahab’s chariot to get ahead of the rain that was coming. But he spent himself outrunning the horses and the words of Jezebel discouraged him. He went into the wilderness and lay down, wishing to die. The angel of the Lord came and gave him food and he slept again. Then, and only then could he go on and finish his God-appointed work and turn it over to Elisha.

HAVE YOU GROWN TIRED? IN THE SERVICE OF GOD ARE YOU SPENT? Do you need to break up the fallow ground so the seed of the Word of God can once again grow in you and prosper your journey in serving the Lord?

TODAY'S SONG IS:
Break Up Your Fallow Ground, sung by Kathy Owens and Tammy Thomas.
Chorus - Break up my fallow ground; give a heart just like Your own; where Your word will find sweet soil everywhere that it is sown.  Break up my fallow ground; rid my heart of sinful stone; break up my fallow ground, my heart Your throne.

Verse 1 -  Lord, you saved me with Your Blood You shed on Calvary, and sweet blessings You have given every day; but my stubborn heart has often not been yielded to Your plan You had for me, Your perfect way.
​
Verse. 2 - Every day I am so easily distracted from the glory and the joy of serving Thee. Wicked pride and bitterness are there to strangle; sinful habits keep me from the victory.
 
Read Through the Bible in a Year
 JUNE 4, 2017 - TUESDAY
 A.M. 2Chronicles 13-16    P.M. John 14
(Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)

Good Verse to Memorize:
He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.  (Psalm 91:1)

Song for Today: 
Break Up My Fallow Ground (3:35) (Tammy Thomas & Kathy Owens)     
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thank you....

6/2/2019

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                Thank You…                
In everything give thanks: for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus concerning you.  (1Thessalonians 5:18) 
 
A PRAYING CHILD HAS SOMETHING TO TEACH US.  They may pray for each member of the family, their five cousins and grandparents, the family’s three dogs, and the kittens that haven’t been named yet.  At Sunday school they may request prayer for their injured foot that has been healed for two years and sometimes for a doll they have decided is sick.
 
SOME CHILDREN JUST SEEM TO KNOW THAT PRAYER IS A GOOD THING. Others have to be taught to pray at mealtime and bedtime. The first prayers are thank-you prayers. The early years are such important years of a child’s life.
 
SAYING "THANK YOU" IS ONE OF THE BEDROCKS OF A CIVILIZED SOCIETY. I have long believed that if parents allow their child to receive a stick of gum without saying “Thank you,” they are teaching their child to be a criminal.  The child gets the idea: “There’s something about me that deserves this stick of gum.” A child who believes everything is owed to him is on his way to a lot of pain and so are the people who taught him/her.
 
ONE OF THE BEST WAYS TO INSTILL A THANK-YOU ATTITUDE IN CHILDREN is to thank them for things they do. Acts of obedience are worthy of a parental Thank you!  Picking up toys deserve a hearty Thank you! And there are many fitting occasions to say “please” to a child. “Please” and “thank you” is the dependable lubricating oil of a home and any other human institution. Fifty years ago, I was reading through the Bible and was arrested by this verse in Romans:
 
Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened (Romans 1:21). (There are eleven more verses that get really bad.)
 
THESE PEOPLE GOT INTO A MORAL SWAMP when they failed to glorify God and failed to be thankful. It’s in your Bible. Thank-you won’t save your eternal soul, but it is a positive exercise of the soul that helps to keep us from becoming ego maniacs and criminals. I’ve seen poor and wealthy people do well (and very badly) with their children. It is of utmost importance to teach them to work as a normal part of life and to appreciate what people give them and do for them.
 
SOME PEOPLE STARVE THEMSELVES SO THEY CAN GIVE THEIR CHILDREN what they never had, and in the process, they ruin them. They raise an ungrateful misfit. I’ve been watching this go on for a long time and it’s the truth. We should love children with all of our hearts and make them feel loved, but there is the ever pressing need to install in the child the sturdy pillar of thanksgiving and appreciation of “a job well-done”  that will help them reach their God-given potential in due time.
 
WE HAVE BUILT INTO US A GREAT NEED TO GIVE THANKS to other people, and especially to God. One of the most valuable things I ever read in my whole life is this:
 
For who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?  (1Corinthians 4:7).
 
HAVE YOU THANKED GOD FOR YOUR FINGERS LATELY? Your eyes? Can you smell things? See colors? The Book of Psalms is full of words and verses of thanksgiving that can be read to God as our own sincere prayer of thanksgiving to Him. Our great hymns of the Christian faith will help us give thanks to God. The Bible and a hymn book are worth their weight in gold and should be in every home and should be used daily. 
 
THE HYMN BOOK SHOULD INCLUDE THE GREAT CLASSIC HYMNS. The featherweight 7/11 choruses (seven words sung eleven times) don’t do much for me. But if that’s all you’ve been taught, and it helps you worship the Lord then use it to the glory of God. The result is that we should thank the Lord and praise Him every day of our lives.
 
By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of our lips giving thanks to his name (Hebrews 13:15).
 
Giving thanks always for all things unto God and the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ; (Ephesians 5:20).
 
Be careful (anxious, worried) for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God (Philippians 4:6). Ω
 
Read Through the Bible in a Year
JUNE 3, 2018 - MONDAY
A.M. 2 Chronicles 1-3   P.M. John 12:1-19
 (Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)

Good Verse to Memorize:
Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer.  (Psalm 19:14)

Song for Today:
Surely Goodness and Mercy (3:20) (Dick Anthony & 16 Singing Men - plus one, plus three girls who enhance the group. The string bass is a genuine double-bass; nothing sounds like a plucked double-bass. Love them. Used to own one.)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISO18SCs-80
You may have to adjust the volume or delete an ad.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
           
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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and others...

5/31/2019

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                     And Others…
And others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment:  They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented;  (Hebrews 11:36-37)
 
MUCH OF THE BIBLE'S TREASURE is invested in its many phrases.  Some of the best preaching and teaching comes from expounding Bible phrases. I learned this from reading Charles H. Spurgeon and Arthur Pink who were both master weavers of Bible phrases. Today’s title: “And Others…” towers over many other phrases.
 
SINGLE WORDS AE ALSO INVALUABLE IN DIGGING BIBLE TREASURE. Dr. Mark Cambron, Dean of Tennessee Temple Bible School stopped many times in his lectures to remind us that anytime we see the word: “Therefore” in the Bible, we must stop and see what it’s “there for.” There’s a place for speed reading through the Bible. But we also need to bring our pick and shovel and patiently compare Scripture with Scripture, study, meditate.
 
PASTOR KENT KELLY WAS KNOWN FOR HIS CONSTANT REMINDER that a Bible subject is not known until it has been studied in every place it occurs in the Bible. This one-page devotional is too short for such digging. And alas, I fear that some may bring only a thimble to get a morning snack and cannot tolerate many paragraphs. So, we do what we can with one page.
 
OUR TEXT TODAY FOLLOWS 35 VERSES IN THE GREAT FAITH CHAPTER: Hebrews eleven. For thirty-five verses we have heard all the great things from the hand of God to His humble servants in various kinds of trouble. I love to hear about the dead being raised back to life, of Noah building the ark and Abraham and Sarah having a child when they were too old, and Sarah burst out in laughter. Hebrews eleven ought to be read often while we live on this earth.  It can rub off on us and help us to trust God better.
 
BUT SUDDENLY, TWO WORDS CONFRONT US LIKE A GREAT MOUNTAIN SLIDE blocking the road: “And others,” at verse 36.  Some of God’s people are being laughed at; some are being whipped or beaten with sticks and clubs until they are bloody and shaking violently in excruciating pain! Others are being stoned to death. The prophet Isaiah is there. He’s in a wooden box and two men are sawing him in half. “Isaiah what are you doing in that box?” “I’m dying by faith!”
 
OTHERS HAD GREAT FAITH. I’d rather see people being healed and miracles all around, and people being helped. I’ve seen some people healed and I’ve been healed against the expectations of the doctor. I enjoy that kind of faith much more than the “And others” kind of faith. 
 
JESUS TOLD PEOPLE: If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow me.  (Luke 9:23)  We should expect God to do things but we shouldn’t be surprised when  He takes a different road than the main highway.  I think it takes more faith to lay your child or other family member in a grave than it does to get them healed. It took me a long time to think that way.
 
IT'S TOUGH TO BELIEVE THAT GOD'S WAY IS THE BEST WAY when His way is for your loved one to be laid in the grave. You know about others being healed but at your house the death angel came.  You have to decide if you’re going to get mad at God. 
 
 I WOULD LIKE TO DO ALL MY DEALING WITH GOD IN THE FIRST 35 VERSES where good things are happening, and people are rejoicing and shouting.  Mary, the mother of Jesus, had to drink from the “and others” cup as she stood at the foot of the cross and watched her firstborn push his feet against the nails to get another breath. Jesus prayed to be delivered from the “cup” if it was the Father’s will. It wasn’t the Father’s will.
 
THEN WE READ: (OF WHOM THE WORLD WAS NOT WORTHY:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.  And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:  God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.  (Hebrews 11:38-40)
 
THESE ALL DIED IN FAITH WITHOUT HAVING RECEIVED THE THING PROMISED TO THEM.  Not long ago, Christians in Iraq lined up on their knees in orange suits to have their heads cut off, as did the Apostle Paul. Peter was crucified upside down. In Oregon, students confessed they were Christians knowing they were going to be shot (as they did in the Columbine school several years ago.)  We may have to be “And others.”  God furnishes grace for dying that we don’t need on an ordinary day. Meantime, we want to walk with God each day as did Enoch, Noah, and all those who have gone on before us.
 
Read Through the Bible in a Year
MAY 31, 2018 - FRIDAY
A.M. 2 Chronicles 1-3   P.M. John 12:1-19
 (Bible Gateway will read this to you if you like. Look for the speaker icon.)

Good Verse to Memorize:
 Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be acceptable in thy sight, O LORD, my strength, and my redeemer.  (Psalm 19:14)

Song for Today:
Surely Goodness and Mercy (3:20) (Dick Anthony & Singing Men)
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISO18SCs-80
  You can let it play and several more songs are in the album. (I think...) 
  You may have to adjust the volume or delete an ad.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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    Dan Carr is a "retired" pastor, writer, teacher and continues to write at this website. This blog and other articles are e-mailed free to anyone who wants them. Go to: 
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    Dan and Barbara live 
    at Flat Rock, AL between Chattanooga, TN and Huntsville, AL. on Sand Mtn.
    We enjoy gardening, reading, church, family and friends.

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