Holy Water!

"Because this people has rejected
       the gently flowing waters of Shiloah
       and rejoices over Rezin
       and the son of Remaliah,

therefore the Lord is about to bring against them
       the mighty floodwaters of the River —
       the king of Assyria with all his pomp.
       It will overflow all its channels,
       run over all its banks

and sweep on into Judah, swirling over it,
       passing through it and reaching up to the neck.
       Its outspread wings will cover the breadth of your land,
       O Immanuel !"

Isaiah 8:6-8

Without water no one can live very long. Without air you die quickly, but without water the path to the end of life is very short as well. Water sustains life, washes away dirt and provides the necessary stuff of every growing plant.

Water can be used to baptize the believer or drown the sinner who is unrepentant. Its spiritual counterpart is called the “water of life” and streams of living water flow out of every child of God. God’s first worldwide judgment came on the world by means of water. The flood washed away the whole population of wicked men allowing humanity to begin again with Noah and his descendants.

When Jesus died on the cross and the soldier pierced His side water and blood came out. The significance of the blood of Jesus is without question, but what about the water? Could it have been the water of life?

As you see the floods of God’s judgment and wrath, and as you see men and women immersed in the Love of God by faith in Jesus, never forget that you cannot live without the water of life that flows from the Throne of God! It is indeed, in the truest sense of the Word, Holy Water! Amen!

Instruction Manual!

Finish your outdoor work
       and get your fields ready;
       after that, build your house.

Proverbs 24:27

When people moved to settle the American west in the 1800’s this verse in Proverbs provided very helpful instruction for those who knew the Bible. If you build your house first and miss the growing season, you may starve in your comfortable, warm bed! The Bible is more than simply theological commentary on spiritually eternal truth. It is that of course, but it is also filled with practical advice about how to live your life and relate to those around you.

When the Bible says “children obey your parents in the Lord” it gives every child the key to a life that avoids great pain and suffering. The fallen nature of man is to rebel against authority and that nature is indeed present even in small children. When a child makes the wise choice to be obedient there is great gain.

The Bible tells us that it is God’s design that marriage should be one man and one woman for life. Look around at those who have ignored that advice and see the complicated consequences. Then look at those who married and stayed together for the balance of their lives. The rewards are immense.

So, when you read the Bible, look for more than to become spiritually knowledgeable. The Bible, in many ways speaks to your daily life and is the ultimate “How To” book. Pray that God will show you things in the Bible that will direct your life in practical ways. Yes, the Word of God is the instruction manual for God’s human creation! Compare your ways against God’s ways and make all appropriate changes!

Flood of God’s Wrath!

As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.

Matthew 24:37-39

Can you imagine how it must have been for those who were alive when the flood came and covered the entire earth? It was just a cloudy day. Then it became a heavy rain and storm. Then it became a flash flood. Finally a serious flood was upon them and even that did not stop. It was unprecedented. Nothing like this had ever happened before.

“Is this what that old man Noah had predicted? But Noah was an idiot! Who could believe his ranting?” Then there was no turning back the judgment of God on the world. The time for repentance had ended. There was no more time for revival. God had decided to destroy the earth and everyone in it except Noah and his immediate family. God baptized the earth and cleansed it from all wickedness.

God promised never again to destroy the earth with water. You can rest assured that there will not be another world wide flood. But God’s judgment of wickedness has never ended. He will deal with evil. There is only one way to avoid the recompense of God for evil. That way is by repentance which results in revival.

The grace of God does not ignore evil. Evil is either dealt with by the blood of Jesus or it is dealt with by the wrath of God. Evil is either covered by the blood and wiped away by its cleansing power, or it is covered by the flood of God’s wrath and burned away in the fire of His judgment.

The days of Noah are being repeated on this earth. This time God’s judgment will come with the return of Jesus to the earth. Will you be Noah or part of the wicked world which is oblivious to the imminent coming judgment of God? Don’t be fooled. Be ready!

What Do You Hear?

How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.

1 John 3:1-2

When the world honors you for your faith in God, you should be troubled and very afraid! Genuine faith in God is not seen as a good thing by the kingdom of this world. When you are honored by the world for your Christianity, you should immediately examine your relationship with God to see if it is authentic.

Non believers are capable of honoring you for your good works, but they have no way of examining and evaluating your faith.

So how do I know that my faith in God is real? If I depend on the evaluation of other believers I know that they can be deceived because they don’t know my every thought.

Real faith comes from hearing God’s Word! Your heart comes to accept and believe in what you hear. When people hear a lie repeated over and over they come to believe it. Their “faith” in the lie comes from hearing it over and over. When we hear the truth repeatedly we also believe it! That is why Satan fights hard to keep the Word of God out of the market place, our schools, and our government. Hearing God’s Word produces faith in the hearers.

Real faith is not hoping that something is true. Faith is the “evidence of things not seen.” There are many things that I have not seen, but I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are real and true.

If you are being honored for your righteousness by those who are unrighteous, there is something very wrong with that story. If you are being persecuted for your faith, take heart. That is what happened to the Lord Himself. Jesus is the benchmark for everything in life. Measure your life against His. Measure your thoughts and words against those of Jesus. Pay no attention to the other voices. It is only the voice of Jesus that deserves your attention. Then you will grow in faith and become strong in the Lord!

Blade of Grass!

For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God. For,
   "All men are like grass,
      and all their glory is like the flowers of the field;
   the grass withers and the flowers fall,
    but the word of the Lord stands forever." And this is the word that was preached to you.

1 Peter 1:23-25

Passion for a perfect lawn is indeed very symbolic. The lawn care experts encourage us to make the short life of a blade of grass as beautiful and esthetically pleasing as possible. We fertilize, kill the dandelions, and post the area with keep off the grass signs. But in a few short months the object of our attention dies and is gone.

Focus on our physical body and our life here on earth is like caring for a blade of grass. We spend our time and money making this life as beautiful and esthetically pleasing as possible. Then in a few short years our bodies can no longer continue to live and we die. No matter how beautiful the lawn its glory fades as other years come and other lawns display their brief glory to the world around them.

The Word of God can turn a blade of grass into an eternally flowering plant! When you hear His Word and are Born Again because that seed was planted in you, then everything changes. Your life was temporary but now it is eternal. You had no hope for the future, but now you have hope forever! You had a moment of glory, but now you will have glory for all time and beyond!

Let the Word of God dwell richly in you! Think about it, speak it, and ponder the implications of God’s Word in your daily life. Memorize it. Carrying the Word of God in your heart is more potent than carrying a concealed weapon in your pocket.

The truth of life on this earth is that Jesus may indeed be coming soon, but as a blade of grass, I am going soon whether He comes soon or not! Jesus will come and I will go. But, I must spend my time getting ready to go rather than trying to predict the time of His return. If I am not ready to meet Jesus in the air, then I will not be ready to meet Him when I die. Prepare today to meet Jesus, nothing else will matter!

Repentance and Revival!

 If you ever forget the LORD your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed. Like the nations the LORD destroyed before you, so you will be destroyed for not obeying the LORD your God.

Deuteronomy 8:19-20

The tragedy of Alzheimer’s disease is great. To put it in the simplest of terms you forget the ones you love. After years of relationship recognition fades and the victim of the disease no longer knows even his closest family members. I have not had a close encounter with this disease, but am told it is like the person dies and only their living and breathing body is left for the last few years of their life.

There is no indication that Alzheimer’s is the result of some bad behavior or sin in your life, but it is certainly a type of a spiritual condition caused by sin. When we turn to sin and away from righteousness, even for a time, we begin to forget the God who created us. As “Spiritual Alzheimer’s” sets in we daily redefine God as someone who is not important to our existence. Finally, God becomes altogether irrelevant to our lives or the world around us.

That is when a man is transformed into an enemy of God’s people. That is when Deuteronomy 8 and God’s promise of destroying a nation comes into play. The United of America is suffering from Spiritual Alzheimer’s. We were born out of the love for and fear of God, but have progressed into a nation standing in firm opposition to any and every influence of God on our land.

If you know history, and we don’t, God has destroyed other nations for the same offense. The fix for our nation is not in getting the debt under control or even in shutting our borders and getting corruption under control. The fix is totally in repentance and revival. Until and unless those two things happen nothing else will matter.