On Sabbatical...

To say I am a little frustrated would be a gross understatement. Even with a firewall on my computer, I tend to get viruses from time to time. During the past week, I have been trying to eradicate whatever virus, spyware or trojan horse is plaguing me this time. It frustrates me that someone else has all that spare time to write malicious software and I have to spend hours on end trying to fix it on my computer. I don't have time for it obviously. So for now, no online banking, no online ordering (which is nice at Christmas time), and I probably won't be putting any blog entries out here until I can either get it fixed or get a new computer. So... stay tuned... I'll be back. Keep checking.

Sugar?

I guess you could draw a spiritual parallel with everything in life. Eating sugar is no exception. I have had acid reflux for several years now (I’ll spare you all the gory details). The doctor had prescribed the purple pill for me and it worked really great. No heartburn whatsoever. The problem with the purple pill was that it masked the real reason for my excessive acid in my stomach. Knowing that one can never take a pill without some side effect, my goal has been to get off of taking medication for my ailment. I quit cold turkey and then decided it was time to experiment with my diet to figure out what was causing the acid reflux.

It was not ‘fatty foods’ like the doctor had suggested (like peanut butter, cheese, etc). My next logical guess was sugar. So I quit eating sweets – candy, cake, cookies, anything high in sugar. Cold turkey. The results? Drastic improvement! I still get heartburn on an occasion, but nothing that a good ol’ Tums wouldn’t take care of.

What is the spiritual lesson here? Filling my mind with junk is much like filling my stomach full of junk. What am I reading, listening to and looking at? Am I reading spiritually candy-coated books and magazines, or am I diving into thick and deep and heavy Biblical doctrines? Is Christian radio taking the place of my own hard work of diligent study? Am I watching too much CSI Miami and Monday Night Football instead of pouring over the Word of God? I would suggest there is too much sugar in our walk with Christ and no amount of Nexium is going to cure that. It’s time to get healthy in our diets… or get burned with a serious spiritual health problem.

Living a Life Preparing for Death

Our neighbor three doors down fell down a set of steps on Saturday. She died yesterday. Several years ago, in a different neighborhood, our next door neighbors were in a fatal car accident. He died immediately; she went into a 5 year long coma that ended in her death. All of these people were 'young'. When the reality of death literally hits so close to home, it makes me ponder the fact that we need to be getting ready for our own death. You just never know when your number is up.

Death is the intruder. Death is not natural. Sin and death are the invaders. But nonetheless, death is a fact and reality. Should we ignore death? Should we ignore the afterlife and pretend it doesn't exist? Many people do. As Christians, we need to prepare. I don't mean getting the plot paid for and the will ready... although those things are important. We need to leave a godly legacy for our children. We need to study God. We need to study His one and only Son. We need to cultivate that relationship with our Father and our Savior... we're going to be face to face with them in a blink of an eye (life is a vapor you know). So we need to prepare to see them.
Am I ready?
Are you ready?

While You Were Sleeping

The snowfall today had me thinking forward a few weeks to Christmas. Read these compelling Christmas lyrics by the band Casting Crowns:

Oh little town of Bethlehem
Looks like another silent night
Above your deep and dreamless sleep
A giant star lights up the sky
And while you're lying in the dark
There shines an everlasting light
For the King has left His throne
And is sleeping in a manger tonight

Oh Bethlehem, what you have missed while you were sleeping
For God became a man
And stepped into your world today
Oh Bethlehem, you will go down in history
As a city with no room for its King
While you were sleeping
While you were sleeping

Oh little town of Jerusalem
Looks like another silent night
The Father gave His only Son
The Way, the Truth, the Life had come
But there was no room for Him in the world He came to save

Jerusalem, what you have missed while you were sleeping
The Savior of the world is dying on your cross today
Jerusalem, you will go down in history
As a city with no room for its King
While you were sleeping
While you were sleeping

United States of America
Looks like another silent night
As we're sung to sleep by philosophies
That save the trees and kill the children
And while we're lying in the dark
There's a shout heard 'cross the eastern sky
For the Bridegroom has returnedAnd has carried
His bride away in the night

America, what will we miss while we are sleeping
Will Jesus come again
And leave us slumbering where we lay
America, will we go down in history
As a nation with no room for its King
Will we be sleeping
Will we be sleeping

United States of America
Looks like another silent night

Some Advice from Bishop J.C. Ryle

Listen to me and I will give you a few short hints [on reading the Bible]:

1). Begin reading your Bible this very day. The way to do a thing is to do it, and the way to read the Bible is to actually read it. It is not meaning, or wishing, or resolving, or intending, or thinking about it. You must positively read.

2). Read the Bible with an earnest desire to understand it. A Bible that is not understood is a Bible that does no good. Work hard, and do not give up the work in a hurry.

3). Read the Bible with deep reverence. So to your soul, whenever you open your Bible, "O my soul, thou art going to read a message from God."

4). Read the Bible with earnest prayer for the teaching and help of the Holy Spirit. Pray for the Spirit to guide you into all truth. You should beg the Lord Jesus Christ to "open your understanding".

5). Read the Bible with a child-like faith and humility. Resolve to receive heartily every statement of truth, whether you like it or not.

6). Read the Bible with a spirit of obedience and self-application. Sit down to the study of it with a daily determination that you will live by its rules, rest on its statements, and act on its commands. The Bible is read best, which is practiced most.

7). Read the Bible daily. Yesterday’s bread will not feed the labourer today, and today’s bread will not feed the labourer tomorrow. Do not scramble over and hurry your reading. Give the Bible the best and not the worst part of your time.

8). Read all the Bible and read it in an orderly way.

9). Read the Bible fairly and honestly. The right way of interpreting Scripture is to take it as we find it, without any attempt to force it into any particular system.

10). Read the Bible with Christ continually in view. The grand primary view of all Scripture is to testify of Jesus.

The Freedom to Murder Act

"The first thing I'd do as president is sign the

Freedom of Choice Act. That's the first thing that I'd do."

-- Senator Barack Obama, speaking to the Planned Parenthood Action Fund, July 17, 2007

The Freedom of Choice Act, if it becomes law, will certainly make abortions more common and more accepted. The sanctity of life will be trampled even more than it already is in our culture and the resulting devastation will be incalculable.

As Christians, we have a duty to speak for the unborn. It is time to do away with complacency and exercise our own freedom of choice as Moses outlined to his people in Deuteronomy 30. They had a choice between life and prosperity OR death and adversity. "Love the Lord and walk in His ways… keep His commandments and His statutes and His judgments that you may live and multiply". Moses goes on to say, "I have set before you life and death, the blessing and the curse. So CHOOSE LIFE, that you may live…"

So how do we ‘choose life’, when no one around us shares our values? What is our responsibility? How do we speak for the unborn? Here is a good start:
1). Education ourselves on the abortion issue. Understand what our officials are doing with pro-life and abortion laws. More importantly, understand what God says in His Word about this issue. Be ready, in season and out of season, to share truth with those whom you discuss this issue.
2). Contact your representatives and politely, but firmly, make your case as to why the Freedom of Choice Act will be a disaster for women, for our country, and for the world.
3). Most importantly, pray with fervency and with regularity for the sponsors of the bill and for President-elect Barack Obama (1 Timothy 2:1-2). Pray for their salvation. Pray for a change of mind and a softening of heart when it comes to preserving the lives of the most helpless among us.

If we continue to remain inactive on this issue, have we not made choice that Moses warned against?
May God be pleased to have our leaders overwhelmingly reject this bill.

Trampling Under Foot

The lone piece of communion bread fell from the tray and landed on the burgundy carpet. As my head bowed over the front pew, what represented the body of Christ lay unnoticed on the floor in front of the altar. Then one of the men passing out the elements moved and stepped on the bread, and in a turning motion he unwittingly ground the square of bread further into the rug. A few moments later, the men all returned to get the wine to pass out. Several of the men missed stepping on the piece of bread, but two of them stepped on it again. The last man who went into position to receive the tray of wine not only stepped on it again, but then he kicked the bread about two feet to the right. Eventually, one of the deacons noticed the badly battered and almost crumbled piece of communion bread and thankfully picked it up. He put the bread in his pocket - though kicked around a bit and stepped upon - still whole and complete.

"For if we go on sinning willfully after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a terrifying expectation of judgment and the fury of a fire which will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the Law of Moses dies without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much severer punishment do you think he will deserve who has trampled under foot the Son of God…" - Hebrews 10:26-29

When Its All Been Said and Done

I love music that causes worship to well up within my soul. I love music that provokes me to consider the beauty of Christ and the greatness of God’s salvation. I love music that makes me to consider the strength and power and glory that Jesus is so worthy of. This morning as I was exercising with my wife I heard a song I never heard before, and once again the preciousness of my Savior and the promise of my future home and inheritance was laid before me. The song is ‘When Its All Been Said and Done’, by Don Moen:

When it's all been said and done
There is just one thing that matters
Did I do my best to live for truth?
Did I live my life for you?

When it's all been said and done
All my treasures will mean nothing
Only what I have done
For love's rewards
Will stand the test of time

Lord, your mercy is so great
That you look beyond our weakness
That you found purest gold in miry clay
Turning sinners into saints

I will always sing your praise
Here on earth and in heaven after
For you've joined me at my true home
When it's all been said and done
You're my life when life is gone...

Stop. And Start.

People wanted change and now we all are about to get it. Even though we still live in the greatest country on the planet, we are perhaps one more step on the continual slide south. We are in fact on the brink of slipping down a morally bankrupt slope that we’ll never be able to recover from. It is a hard reality that the President-elect does not share the values that Bible-believing Christians hold, regardless of how many sermons he’s heard.

But why so downcast? Hope in God, for I shall again praise Him for the help of His presence (Psalm 42:5).

This event in our country’s history should provoke true believers to re-evaluate our priorities. It’s time to ‘stop and start’…
1). Stop crying. Start rejoicing. (1 Thessalonians 5:16)
2). Stop whining. Start praying. (1 Thessalonians 5:17)
3). Stop speculating about the future. Start reading and studying our Bibles. (Matthew 6:34, 2 Timothy 2:15).
4). Stop fretting over the liberal agenda. Start evangelizing the lost. (Matthew 28:19-20)
5). Stop negative put-downs and personal attacks. Start counting our blessings. (Psalm 103)

I’ll be the first one to call out the President-elect on issues that I hold dear to my heart, such as the murder of all our little babies… and we have an obligation to do so. But let’s first examine ourselves and make sure we’re about the Lord’s work as our number one priority. And remember: if the great apostle is right in Philippians 3:20, ‘our citizenship is in heaven’.

Smarter than Plato

Just when you think you aren't quite getting a deep theological concept... just when you're discouraged about grasping a thick doctrine from God's Word... just when you get to a tough passage that doesn't quite make sense... a servant of God, Bishop J.C. Ryle comes along and gives us these words of encouragement from his booklet 'How Readest Thou?':

There is an extraordinary depth, fullness, and richness in the contents of the Bible. It throws more light on a vast number of most important subjects than all the other books in the world put together. It boldly handles matters which are utterly beyond the reach of man, when left to himself. It treats of things which are mysterious and invisible – the soul, the world to come, and eternity – depths which man has no line to fathom. All who have tried to write of these things, without Bible light, have done little but show their own ignorance. The grope like the blind; they speculate; they guess; they generally make the darkness more visible, and land us in a region of uncertainty and doubt. How little did the wisest of the heathen know! How dim were the views of Socrates, Plato, Cicero and Seneca! A well-taught Sunday-school child, in the present day, knows more spiritual truth than all these sages put together.

John Charles Ryle went to heaven in 1900, but not before writing much excellent material to exhort, teach and encourage the Christian church, like this quote above. He was greatly used of God. His successor described him as 'a man of granite with a heart of a child'. Spurgeon said he was an 'evanglical champion'. I look forward to getting to know J.C. Ryle more in the near future.

Complaining or Trusting?

Thinking of whining and complaining tomorrow if the election doesn’t go your way?

As you think of all your lamenting that might go on at the water cooler, consider Jeremiah’s words: "Why should any living mortal, or any man, offer complaint in view of his sins? Let us examine and probe our ways, and let us return to the LORD." – Lamentations 3:39-40

Be encouraged by thoughts from the mind of David: "Do not fret because of evildoers, be not envious toward wrongdoers. For they will wither quickly like the grass and fade like the green herb. Trust in the LORD and do good; Dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness." – Psalm 37:1-3

Tomorrow, you may be faced with a hard choice…complain or trust.

Sign of the Times #6

Long May It Wave...

The sun shone brightly through my American flag this morning. The American flag, the symbol of freedom. In view of the upcoming election next week, I thought of our national anthem that we've heard countless times... often at sporting events. We know the song by heart, we can repeat the lyrics by heart, probably without even thinking through them. How often, though, have we heard the whole song? Here are the lyrics the to last verse of The Star Spangled Banner:

Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace,
may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made
and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!