Who’s Better?

Posted on January 3, 2017 by jesustrek

boy-and-girlIn the book Children’s Letters to God, one little girl wrote: “Dear God, are boys better than girls? I know you are one, but try to be fair.”

Sometimes we have to be reminded of the importance of women in the Bible. Deborah was a judge. Anna was a prophet. Several woman are listed in Matthew’s genealogy of Jesus. Women were the first ones to spread the good news that Jesus had risen from the dead. Priscilla was a key player in the evangelistic work of the early church. Phoebe was a special servant in the church.

The list goes on and on.

No, little girl. Boys are not better than girls!

“So in Christ Jesus you are all children of God through faith, for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”—Galatians 3:26-28

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Not an Honor Student

Posted on January 2, 2017 by jesustrek
George W. Bush

George W. Bush

President George W. Bush gave the 2001 commencement address at Yale University. He began by saying, “To the A students who are graduating with honors, I say: well done. And to the C students I say: you too can be president of the United States!”

Here are a couple of observations from this statement.

First, a humble, self-effacing attitude is good to see in someone who has become successful.

Second, let us remember that God sometimes uses “C students” to do great things. Many heroes in the Bible were simply ordinary people who were chosen to do extraordinary things. This should encourage us all to believe that God can use anybody—even us!

“Brothers and sisters, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth.”—1 Corinthians 1:26.

 

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Constant Reminder

Posted on December 30, 2016 by jesustrek
Kelly Carr

Kelly Carr

Kelly Carr, editor of the Lookout magazine, writes about a friend of hers who visited with a minister toward the end of summer. Entering the office, he noticed a decorated Christmas tree in the corner. When asked about the tree, the minister explained that he kept the tree up in his office year- round as a reminder of how God came to earth in response to our need for salvation.

It is not just in December that we need to be reminded of God’s love. We need to maintain a sense of gratitude all year long.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”—John 3:16.

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Snipers

Posted on December 29, 2016 by jesustrek

sniperI have read that when snipers are in training for warfare they are instructed to be discriminant about who they shoot. They are trained to discern who the leader is of the enemy group that they have in their sights. If they shoot the leader, the rest of the troop will be thrown into confusion and can more easily be defeated.

It seems that Satan has a similar strategy in his attempts to defeat the church. Satan will target a pastor, or an elder or a deacon. He will try to bring that leader down in some fashion or another. When a shepherd falls, the flock tends to be confused, and can more easily be scattered.

Keeping that in mind, we should be careful not to do Satan’s work for him! It is so easy to complain about the leaders of your church, but they don’t need to be “shot at”!

The Bible says we must respect our leaders and submit to their authority. We ought to do whatever we can to encourage our church leaders.

“Have confidence in your leaders and submit to their authority, because they keep watch over you as those who must give an account. Do this so that their work will be a joy, not a burden, for that would be of no benefit to you.”–Hebrews 13:17.

What can you do to ease the burden of one of your church leaders?

 

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Unlikely Fortunate Event

Posted on December 27, 2016 by jesustrek

tornado-clip-art-pngMilton Berle once joked that a tornado touched down in New Jersey and did $20 million worth of improvements!

Part of what makes that joke funny is the fact that order cannot possibly come out of chaos in nature. This, of course, refutes the basic premise behind the theory of evolution. It is ridiculous to believe that a big explosion randomly occurred, followed by a long series of fortunate accidents and…well…here we are!

How ludicrous! It is much more reasonable to believe what the Bible says about the origin of the universe.

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”—Gen.1:1.

“By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.”—Heb.11:3.

 

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Telling the Truth Gracefully

Posted on December 26, 2016 by jesustrek
Mark Twain

Mark Twain

Mark Twain once said, “Last week, I stated a certain woman was the ugliest woman I had ever seen. I have since been visited by her sister, and now wish to withdraw that statement.”

Twain’s humorous comment points out the difficulty of being truthful and graceful at the same time. I suppose that there are some opinions that we should keep to ourselves in order to spare the feelings of others.

However, there are some truths that must not be withheld from people because they are critically important. It is essential that these truths be delivered with all the grace that we can possibly muster, so that the message will be more likely to be accepted.

Jesus was a master at being completely truthful and, at the same time, completely graceful. We would do well to try to imitate him in this regard.
“The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.”—John 1:14.

 

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By Grace

Posted on December 23, 2016 by jesustrek

Praying before the cross

Someone once explained the grace of God by telling the following story:

Suppose you lived in a place where a king ruled the land. Now suppose that you rebelled against the king. In response to your rebellion, the king sent his son, but you killed the king’s son.

Now suppose that, instead of condemning you for your action, the king forgave you. And not only did he forgive you, he also made you an heir to all of his riches. What would you do? Would you save up a lot of money and bring it to the king and say, “Here, now we’re even?” Of course not! What an insult that would be!

In the same way, we could never pay God back for what he has done for us through Jesus. Oh, we live our lives for him, but it is not to “pay him back”. We could never earn our salvation. We do not deserve his grace. We must humbly accept the forgiveness that we could never bring about on our own.

That’s what grace is all about.

“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.”—Ephesians 2:8-9.

 

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Disappointment with God

Posted on December 22, 2016 by jesustrek
Randy Alcorn

Randy Alcorn

There seems to be a high level of discontentment with many people today. Randy Alcorn speaks about this:

“Our culture is riddled with a poisonous spirit of entitlement. We always think we deserve more. We’re disappointed with our family, neighbors, church, the waitress, the sales clerk, and the department of motor vehicles. Ultimately we’re disappointed with God. He hasn’t given us everything we want.

What madness! If only we could see our situation clearly—even for a moment. We deserved expulsion; He gives us a diploma. We deserved the electric chair; He gives us a parade. Anything less than overwhelming gratitude should be unthinkable. He owes us nothing. We owe Him everything. When you realize you deserve nothing better than hell, it puts a ‘bad day’ in perspective, doesn’t it?”

“Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given.”—John 1:16.

“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father…”—James 1:17.

 

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Nice Gesture

Posted on December 21, 2016 by jesustrek

baptism-clip-artWhen I baptize people, they sometimes show their joy in a tangible way before they even get out of the water. This is understandable, since they realize that their sins have been washed away (Acts 22:16) and they have been united with Jesus (Rom.6:3-4).

Over the years I have received several wet hugs in the baptistery. Recently I baptized a lady who not only gave me a big hug, she also planted a kiss on my cheek for good measure!

It’s making me look forward to my next baptism!

“Greet one another with a holy kiss…”—Romans 16:16.

 

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Really Hearing It

Posted on December 20, 2016 by jesustrek

christmas-carolsSometimes we sing familiar Christian songs so many times that we tend to sing the words without giving a lot of thought to the meaning. The Christmas songs especially have many lines that are deeply meaningful to our faith, and that express very vividly what happened that first Christmas.

This past Sunday we sang “Silent Night” at our church. When we sang the words “shepherds quake at the sight” it really impacted me. The Bible says that the shepherds were “terrified” when an angel appeared before them to tell them the good news about the birth of Jesus. How frightened they must have been! I would have been scared too, and so would you.

Maybe we all should pledge to listen more closely to the words we sing. When we really hear the message, it makes all the difference in the world.

“An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified.”—Luke 2:9.

 

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