Facebook posts over the past six months…

Some thoughts I shared on Facebook over the past six months, starting with the most recent. I was very much encouraged. Check out your own history, it might happily surprise you, too.

“Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, to you have I given it…” (Note the past tense)

If I only had two words to encourage and exhort myself and others, they would be, “But God.”

The sins you have done, and the sins done to you, were paid for alike at the cross.

We don’t enter into maturing when our only concern is “knowing,” as if knowing scripture were the point. We are instead brought to our knees when we press into doing–there our high estimation of what we know is humbled by how little we can do. When we obey scripture in the simple everyday of life we begin to truly know.  “I have more understanding than all my teachers: for thy testimonies are my meditation. I understand more than the ancients, because I KEEP thy precepts.” Psa 119:99-100

40 years ago, when wanting to justify living together, the argument was often made, “It’s just a piece of paper.” Today, wanting to justify same sex relationships as normative, that “piece of paper” means everything. Didn’t buy it either time.

Jesus Christ loves you. The world–every part of it–hates you.

Woke up this morning overwhelmed. Cried out. Then God. He came by here and calmed the storm in my soul.

We are more sinful than we dare imagine. But we are more loved than we dare hope.

What is it that God cannot do for you? “When Caleb and Joshua said, ‘We are able to overcome the enemy,’ the ten spies, and the six hundred thousand answered, ‘We cannot do it; they are too strong for us.'” What is too strong for you? You sure that is the position you want to take?

End prayerlessness

There is no want of pontificating experts, whether they be political or religious, old or new. Considering themselves expert teachers they lack being teachable. Look for those scarred yet joyfully laboring, not those clamoring for attention and glory.

Is it possible to be a disciple, and not be making disciples? Can you follow Christ and not become a fisher of men?

Given that few Christians know how to share the gospel, I guess even fewer know how to pray. No wonder the world surges forward while we become irrelevant and ignored.

To believe that standing in the sunlight you can feel its warmth on your skin, isn’t the same as actually standing in the luminous warmth of the sun. And once experiencing that, you long to be enveloped in the sun’s arms again, and are little comforted by the cold doctrine alone.

Babies are so cute. Baby anything is cute. Baby alligators, baby hippos, baby lions. You’d think babies would be the safest, most protected beings anywhere. You’d be wrong about human babies. 42 million a year are slaughtered worldwide through abortion.

Re: Landmark decision: Alabama court rules aborted baby is a person with rights. -“I thought we were all about science? Doesn’t everyone already know this today? Or are we some lost tribe in the Amazon jungle?”

Be a voice for the screams muffled in the womb.

Re: an image of a baby’s face and hands in a womb. -“If you think the image is offensive but the actual murders are not, your conscience is broken.”

We have to trust God often against our instincts and against what we see around us. It is true that we do not walk by sight.

Libertarianism is just new paint on Libertinism, an old, failed system.

We now have a pro-infanticide Congress. May God grant repentance to our leaders and we the voters for our heartless crimes against living children.

These heartless psychopaths voted to murder babies after they are born. Did you vote for them? You have the blood of children on your hands.

Doing His will isn’t about “the big things” that come along now and then where it is glaringly obvious you want to do or be something different from what He wants. It is about the little moment by moment things, where you have an ear open, an ongoing conversation, and you learn to habitually set aside your own will and actions/reactions and do His will instead. If you learn to choose His will in the little things (where you have no major conflicting desires that make it a big battle), then you will also be able to set aside your will in the big things where you are invested in your own will/desires. We gain strength in little wins (David fought wolves and bobcats before he faced Goliath, and he knew how to trust God in a fight). Learning submission is a moment by moment battle won first in the little things, then becoming a victorious lifestyle. (Remembering this because I need to)

Is Jesus part of your life? Is He a big part of your life? Then you’re doing it wrong. He is your life.

It was once legal to kill Jews in the gas chambers. You had to decide if you would participate in their murder or stand against and be persecuted or murdered for your moral but illegal position. Doctors and nurses are today being forced to make the same decisions with born alive children. Pray for our gruesome nation.

Re: ‘She was alive and crying!’ Abortion nurse quits after baby born alive, left to die. -“We are becoming the most gruesome culture since human sacrifice ended hundreds of years ago.”

Jesus taught by word and example, but the disciples remained in contention with one another in power struggles. Love isn’t taught or caught, it can only be shed from within by the Holy Spirit. Ask Him.

Morning devotions can be like sucking in your stomach when you look in the mirror – falsely reassuring yourself that you are in good shape, but NOT.

Torn limb from limb while alive and screaming, trying to crawl away to safety in her mother’s womb. But there is no safety for this child. Mom’s life is too busy, it’s just not a good time for a baby. Not convenient. Times a million every year.

Like a mother kissing her child, “The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God,” and a sense of security and joy floods our being. Make my ear attentive to your voice and my feet swift to follow your path.

What was the “first love” lost in Ephesus? Was it that they stopped loving God or stopped loving one another? Paul was encouraged by hearing of their, “faith in the Lord Jesus, and love unto all the saints.” Their elders wept when Paul said he would not see them again.

Immoral murderers of innocents. You celebrate your gruesome slaughter and your sexual immorality when you should be on your knees weeping bitterly at your sin. I pray you find repentance and mercy.

Liberals have become a cult without morals who celebrate the slaughter of infants. They hate the family.

hold fast that which is good…

In the end, our identification with Christ on the cross isn’t so much losing what we cherish as it is being set free from what we loathe.

Love costs.
Jn 3:16
God so loved He gave…

Some people make it in this life to being cancer free. Others become cancer free when death is swallowed up in victory. So, basically, becoming cancer free has a 100% success rate.

“Almost painless.” That’s just a euphemism for painful.

Christianity fundamentally clashes with every culture. The gospel is offensive.

Loving Muslims doesn’t mean encouraging their false faith but to proclaim to them the gospel of Jesus Christ

I know. I know. It’s “fact, faith, feeling.” But sometimes, doesn’t your heart just overfill with joy and hope and overwhelming love? I’m so glad for experiencing quiet but consuming emotions with God. Maybe “fact, faith, feelings” isn’t linear. Maybe they form a three legged stool, or a triangle…

We can be seduced little by little into sin. But repentance requires determination in a hard-fought, uphill battle.

In promoting anything, there is “word of mouth” and “mouthing off.” Mouthing off is advertising, telling people what to think about your product or service. Word of mouth is users of your product or service telling others what they think about you. In today’s connected world, where we make 500 billion impressions on one another about products and services each year, word of mouth is now more powerful than the advertising in the media, and without word of mouth, mouthing off is useless. Christians? Live it. Then tell it.

We are not to be mirrors of the world made perfect, but portals to see a new and gloriously different world altogether.

FB, Oh FB… I know our country is in a mess and headed downhill. That’s really par for the course in a broken world filled with nothing but sinners. Our histories demonstrate our folly over and over and over. I’m just not sure I want to get pulled into taking sides–they’re all tainted. Rather, I want to focus on living out Christianity–loving God and loving others–in all the little moments and details of my days

To withdraw from sin—even in the smallest victory—is to spread our arms wide to God. Who always welcomes us. Such mercy and grace.

The troubles of Washington are a million miles away when heaven is so close. Sweet lover of our souls!

Omnipresence. That means even when God feels so close to you, to others He does not seem busy elsewhere. Times billions. Yet you still have all of His attention.

You’re not waiting on God. He is ready. God is waiting on you.

I used to try to differentiate between understanding, knowledge and wisdom in the book of Proverbs. The best I ever heard was, “Knowledge speaks, but wisdom listens.” The quote is from Jimi Hendrix.

“I, even I, am He that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins.”

Saddened over the destruction of our nation that is underway. But my real hunger and passion drives me to love and follow Jesus. My real heartbreak is for those facing eternity without Him. Echoing in my ear is “be strong and very courageous.” Josh 1:7-9

“For I am the Lord your God who takes hold of your right hand and says to you, do not fear: I will help you” -Isaiah 41:13

Jan 1. What a bad start. Did get up early (3:30 am) but laid in swaddling blankets on the couch. Pretty much all day. Did not go to the gym. Did not pray for hours. Did not read the bible through-in-a-day. Did eat nearly half an 18″ pizza (oh, yes, I did! But it was Salvio’s, so…). The upside? I woke up “on the floor.” Familiar start. Now I can continue following Jesus without illusions for the rest of the year. If you follow Jesus you’ll have scraped knees from stumbling. It’s humbling. But… JESUS! He still smiles, waves me forward. His encouragements are everywhere. Oh, among them, new favorite singer thanks to kind daughter-in-law: aspirational, settling. If I had a resolution, I would want this song to be moment by moment true… Well, Jan 1 is behind, and Jan 2 is ahead.