Independence Day

Independence Day is a holiday we celebrate commemorating the Declaration of Independence of the United States. The thirteen American colonies were no longer subject to the monarch of Britain, King George III.

When we think of July fourth today, we think of barbeques, fireworks, spending time with friends and family. But it is also a time to celebrate all the freedoms we are given through Christ.

Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God. – 1 Peter 2:16 [ESV]

Stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. – Galatians 5:1 [NKJV]

For you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters. But don’t use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. Instead, use your freedom to serve one another in love. 

– Galatians 5:13 [NLT]

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. 

– 2 Corinthians 3:17 [NIV]

Out of my distress I called on the Lord; the Lord answered me and set me free. – Psalm 118:5 [ESV]

Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord; and the people whom he hath chosen for his own inheritance. – Psalm 33:12 [KJV]

As a nation we are no longer subject to Great Britain, but as a nation are we subject to God? Are we His servants, doing his will? If not, God’s patience will run out and his judgement and wrath will be cast upon our nation.

If you read Romans chapter 1 starting in verse 18, you may think that God’s judgement is already here.

Today, we need to remain hopeful, to live and proclaim the Gospel and stay focused on the freedom we have in Christ.

A Father's Blessing

Message

A FATHER’S BLESSING. Ephesians 3:14-4:3

Today is Father’s Day, a day we celebrate fathers and their impact on their children and families. So I decided to look at some Fathers in the bible and what better place to start than the beginning with Adam who had many sons and daughters. As we know, his first son was Cain and second son was Abel. In Genesis 4:8 we read, “Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.” 

Maybe starting with Adam wasn’t the best idea, so I decided to move to the next major father figure in the bible. In Genesis 6:9-10 we read, “Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his generation. Noah walked with God. And Noah fathered three sons: Shem, Ham, and Japheth.”

We all know the story, they all get on the boat, survive the flood and live happily ever after, right. Not exactly. Sometime after the flood Noah got drunk and Canaan, Ham’s son, was cursed.

So let's move on to the next father, Abram or Abraham as we know him. We know his sons Ishmael and Isaac. Well their descendants are still fighting today, so again maybe not a good example. 

How about Isaac’s sons Esau and Jacob? Jacob tricked Isaac into getting Esau’s birthright blessing. Well then what about Jacob, he had 12 sons, surely one must have turned out alright! Yeah, but the other 11 wanted to kill him and even sold him into slavery.

As we get to the end of Genesis though we find something interesting. Jacob is at the end of his life. Joseph and his two sons Manasseh and Ephraim go to see Jacob. After some brief conversation, we read in Genesis 48:15-16, “Then [Jacob] blessed Joseph and said,

“May the God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked faithfully,

the God who has been my shepherd all my life to this day,

the Angel who has delivered me from all harm —may he bless these boys.

May they be called by my name and the names of my fathers Abraham and Isaac,

and may they increase greatly on the earth.”

 

It is at this point that I realized that the book of Genesis emphasizes the blessing of a father to his sons. The patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob all gave formal blessings to their children—and, in Jacob’s case, to some grandchildren. Receiving a blessing from one’s father was a high honor, and losing a blessing was tantamount to a curse.

An Old Testament blessing of a father to his sons included words of encouragement, details regarding each son’s inheritance, and prophetic words concerning the future.

That is what I want to focus on today: the blessings of a father. 

Being a father means forming and nurturing another human being. Today we’re exploring a powerful tool to do that. It is the Blessing. A Father’s blessing is speaking the word of God over their child.

There are many great blessings in the Bible, one that jumps out at me is from Proverbs 3: “Trust in the Lord with all of your heart, and do not rely on your own insight. In all your ways acknowledge God, and God will make straight your paths.”  (Proverbs 3:5-6)

Who doesn’t want that for their child? Above all else: Trust God and let your feet be led in God’s paths.

In Scripture, a blessing is the greatest gift a parent can give their child. It defines who that child will be when they grow up. In the 49th chapter of Genesis, it says, “The blessings of your parents are mighty beyond the blessings of the eternal mountains,  the bounties of the everlasting hills.”  (Genesis 49:26)

People of courage, faith and integrity don’t just come out of nowhere. The Apostle Paul was like a father to the church in Ephesus. When he writes to them, he says, “I pray, according to the riches of God’s glory, that God may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through the Holy Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love…” (Ephesians 3:16-17)

Do you hear the power of that prayer? Can you imagine what a difference it could make in our children and grandchildren’s lives if every night as they drift off to sleep, they feel our hand upon their head, and they hear our voice praying that God would strengthen them, that God would dwell within them, that God would fill them beyond all fullness with the love of Christ.

This isn’t a prayer we say just once and call it good. Some blessings take time to take root. 

“I pray that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through the Holy Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love…”    (Ephesians 3:16-17)

Rooted and grounded in love. All it needs is our faithfulness; when we remember we can bless life, we can repair the world. We can nurture their heart, and the depth of their spirit.

This isn’t a prayer that they’ll understand right off. The fruit of a growing soul doesn't appear all at once. This is a prayer that sinks into them, waters their spirit, grows inside of them: a prayer that they will understand in time as it forms their very character and expectation of life.

Can we imagine what a difference it would make in our children, our step-children, our grandchildren’s lives to know that we love them enough to pray for them like that. Not praying that she would just be a good little girl, but that she would be filled with the power and love of God.

Not praying that he will just do well in school, but that he will come to know the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that he may be filled with all the fullness of God.

That’s expansive and powerful. A prayer worth molding your life around. A prayer faithfully reinforced every day and every night. That is a prayer of blessing. That is what Genesis claims is mightier than the eternal mountains, more bountiful than the everlasting hills. It’s your blessing.

In Scripture, the blessing is usually spoken aloud as the parent’s hands are on the head of their child. This is not the time for subtlety, saying, “oh, they’ll pick up my faith from my actions”. No, we say the words out loud, clearly, powerfully, so they can hear every syllable.

And we don’t say it from across the room. No, a blessing is a profoundly intimate, physical type of prayer. We lay our whole hand on the child’s head- both hands- gentle, firm, strong. This is an action of incredible authority. Put your hand on someone’s head, and it says “I have power over you.” It is not an insignificant gesture. It is a gesture of power, and we don’t do it unless we’re doing it appropriately, to strengthen, to bless.

Holding our children and grandchildren, the words we speak are a vision, a glimpse of what God is creating inside them. A woman of courage and compassion. A man of integrity and hope. God’s children and God’s people, formed by our continual prayer of blessing.

Listen to Paul’s blessing again, and as I say it, try to imagine one person you’d like to pray it for: I pray… by riches of God’s glory…  that God will strengthen you… in your inner being… that Christ may dwell in your heart… as you are being rooted… and grounded… in love.     (Ephesians 3:16-17)

This prayer in Ephesians ends with these words:“Now to God, who by the power at work within us, is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to God be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.” (Ephesians 3:20-21)

Far more abundantly than all we can ask or imagine… Amen. And what Amen means- it’s a Hebrew word that means, let it be or may it be so.

May our desires be wide and true and faithful enough to be worth praying. May our blessings extend beyond even our own understanding. And may our own souls be broadened in the speaking, in the nurturing, in the creation of the world through the blessing of another person.

Let us pray

Dear Heavenly father, may we truely be a blessing to not only our children today, but to all those that we come into contact with this week. May Christ dwell in our hearts. In the Name of the One whose blessing will never let us go. Amen.

Memorial Day

This weekend we celebrate Memorial Day. Memorial means that we are supposed to remember something.

We remember the soldiers who fought and died so that we can live in a free country. Many of them sacrificed their lives so that we could gather together and worship Christ without being afraid of being punished.

In Deuteronomy 4:9, we read

 “Only be careful for yourself and watch over your soul diligently, so that you do not forget the things which your eyes have seen and they do not depart from your heart all the days of your life; but make them known to your sons and your grandsons.” (NASB)

Moses is teaching the people in the wilderness. In the name of God he is creating a community which will become a nation. He gives them laws that embody the virtues of justice. They will have to fight to claim their homeland and to defend it. They will face many challenges to their commitment to God and justice.

Moses warns them, “But take care and watch yourselves closely, so as neither to forget the things that your eyes have seen nor let them slip from your minds all the days of your life; make them known to your children and your children’s children.”

On our national holidays we are reminded of the values and principles that our founders taught us, and we are called to remember and to pass them along. We renew our commitment to liberty and justice for all.

We give thanks for those who have risked their lives and lost their lives defending those principles. We remember them and thank them for their honor and courage.

On this day we remember the men and women who died for our freedom. But we also remember Jesus Christ who died so that we could have freedom from our sins.

A Prayer for Memorial Day

O Lord God of all, we remember before you with grateful hearts the men and women of our country who paid with their lives for the liberties we now enjoy. Grant that we may not rest until all the people of this land share the benefits of true freedom through Christ our Lord. Amen. 

Politics and the Christian

 Politics and the Christian

When you do a search on the word politics or political in the Bible (ESV) you get zero matches. The Bible doesn’t use those words, but the Bible does, however, have some things to say about government and a Christian’s behavior.

There are many verses on government and the life of a believer, but the passage that keeps jumping out at me is Romans 13:1-7 (ESV).

Verse 1 “Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.”

Isn’t that powerful? God has instituted the governments that exist and we are to obey them (provided, of course, that the government is not issuing orders that are in direct violation of God’s Word).

Think about it, God is telling us (through Paul, the inspired writer of Romans) that we are to obey and respect (verse 7) every position of authority in our lives. This involves the government over its citizens, the Church over its members, parents over their children, and even bosses over their workers.

Governments are here to reward or promote good and restrain and discipline evil. The question is: what is good and what is evil. Christians should be able to answer that with ease.

God expects us to speak out against the evils of society, but we need to do it in a godly and law abiding manner. Two great examples of this life are Daniel and Paul.

As Christians, we are to proclaim the Gospel to the world. We are given that commission in Matthew. Many Christians are politically active and there if nothing wrong with that in itself. The problem arises when a Christian is more concerned with politics than with the Gospel.

We know there are problems with our government and our leaders. They are not perfect. However, we are to hate the sin, not the sinner. Too often, Christians turn people away from the Gospel rather than turn them to it.

Instead of focusing our time and attention on changing or influencing laws, let’s spend our time on changing lives with the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

We need to remember to consistently pray for our leaders so that they may have the will of God revealed in their life. Does your life show the transforming power of the Gospel?

Lifting Our Hands in Surrender to God - Exodus 17: 8-15

Lifting Our Hands in Surrender to God - Exodus 17: 8-15

Opening Prayer

Lord, we thank you for the opportunity to gather here this afternoon and learn about how you want us to live. We thank you for the many blessings that you have placed into our lives. May we honor you. AMEN.

Intro

How many of you like Math class? Who is the teacher? Is she nice?

My 5th grade Math teacher was Mr. Duke and he was mean. Or at least I thought that he was at the time. When you got in trouble in his class he gave you two choices, you could get benched for 5 minutes at recess or you could take the book challenge.

Getting benched meant you had to spend so many minutes sitting on the bench instead of playing during recess time.

The book challenge is where you had to hold your arms out for a certain length of time with books stacked on them. If you dropped the books then you got double the benched time for recess.

So it was a risk you had to be willing to take.

Now, you are probably wondering what holding some books in the air has to do with chapel. Any ideas?


Intro to Exodus 17: 8-15

Our bible passage today is about Moses and the Amalekites.

What do we know about Moses so far, that is up to Exodus 17. We know about his birth, he was placed in a basket and hidden in the reeds by the water. Pharaoh’s daughter finds the baby Moses and that is how he ends up growing up in the royal household. But Moses saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew man so Moses killed the Egyptian and fled to Midian where he married his wife Zipporah and started his family.

While Moses is tending the flock he sees a bush that doesn’t burn up and he hears God call him to free the Israelites from Egypt. This is where God uses Moses’ staff as a sign by turning it into a snake.

Moses heads back to Egypt and meets up with his older brother Aaron. Moses goes to Pharaoh and tells Pharaoh to let his people go. Pharaoh of course refuses and God brings about all of those ten plagues on the Egyptians (blood, frogs, gnats, flies, livestock, boils, hail, locusts, darkness, death of the first borns).

This is where the passover and festival of unleavened bread were instituted. Then Moses led his people out of Egypt and parted the Red Sea so they could escape safely. God provides food and water for the Israelites. Moses strikes the rock and water comes out of it.

Let’s get into the bible here and read Exodus 17:8-15.


Exodus 17:8-15 New International Version

The Amalekites Defeated

8 The Amalekites came and attacked the Israelites at Rephidim. 9 Moses said to Joshua, “Choose some of our men and go out to fight the Amalekites. Tomorrow I will stand on top of the hill with the staff of God in my hands.”

10 So Joshua fought the Amalekites as Moses had ordered, and Moses, Aaron and Hur went to the top of the hill. 11 As long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning, but whenever he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning. 12 When Moses’ hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it. Aaron and Hur held his hands up—one on one side, one on the other—so that his hands remained steady till sunset. 13 So Joshua overcame the Amalekite army with the sword.

14 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Write this on a scroll as something to be remembered and make sure that Joshua hears it, because I will completely blot out the name of Amalek from under heaven.”

15 Moses built an altar and called it The Lord is my Banner.



Story Summary

This story comes as Moses and the Israelites are in the desert. They have been unhappy with their situation. That sounds like us sometimes, doesn’t it. Maybe we grumble about our situation, much like the Israelites. But God has provided manna and quail for food and water from the rock and God provides for us today as well.

The staff that Moses is carrying is the staff that God turned into a snake and God said to “take this wooden staff in your hand. You will be able to do miraculous signs with it.”

The Amalekites came and attacked the Israelites. Amalek was the grandson of Esau, Jacob's twin brother. The Amalekites were semi-nomadic people meaning they moved around when they felt like it and were known as warriors, but not noble warriors. They never fought a fair fight.

Moses called on Joshua to choose some men to go fight. This, by the way, is the first time we see Joshua in the Bible. Moses said he would stand on top of the hill with the staff of God in his hands.

As long as Moses held up his hands, holding the staff of God, the Israelites were winning. When he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning. When his hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under Moses to sit on. Aaron and Hur held his hands up.

Joshua and the Israelites overtook the Amalekites.

This is actually a fairly short story. It is easy to overlook the significance of what this story reveals to us. I believe that the Word of God has only one meaning, but many applications. Moses stood in complete surrender to the Lord. His upheld hands stood as an appeal to God for help. Without his surrender, the Israelites would not have won against the Amalekites.



Questions

Did you ever wonder why some people hold their arms in the air when singing to God? Why do you think they do that? (It is a way to show you are surrendering to God.)

Have you ever helped someone do something very important? Maybe it was as simple as holding a flashlight while they worked. Holding a flashlight for someone is not a very exciting job. In fact it is rather boring, but it is very important. Without light the person working won’t be able to see what they are doing.

Moses was a strong leader and a man of faith. In fact we read about Moses as an example of faith in Hebrews 11:24-28.

24 By faith Moses, when he had grown up, refused to be known as the son of Pharaoh’s daughter. 25 He chose to be mistreated along with the people of God rather than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. 26 He regarded disgrace for the sake of Christ as of greater value than the treasures of Egypt, because he was looking ahead to his reward. 27 By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the king’s anger; he persevered because he saw him who is invisible. 28 By faith he kept the Passover and the application of blood, so that the destroyer of the firstborn would not touch the firstborn of Israel.

But as we saw in our story he needed help. He got tired. Aaron and Hur helped Moses hold up his hands. Aaron, the high priest, was Moses' older brother and Hur, probably a nobleman, was a friend. Because of that help, the Israelites won an important battle.

It is important for us to remember that we all need help sometimes. We can get that help from our family and our friends.



New Testament Examples

Who can think of some examples of friendship in the New Testament.

Jesus - Peter, James, and John


Jesus - Mary, Martha and Lazarus

Jesus had a close friendship with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus to a point where they spoke plainly to him, and he resurrected Lazarus from the dead. True friends are able to speak their minds honestly to one another, whether right or wrong. Meanwhile, friends do what they can to tell each other the truth and help one another.


Paul, Priscilla, and Aquila

Friends introduce friends to other friends. In this case, Paul is introducing friends to one another and asking that his greetings be sent to those close to him.



Paul, Timothy, and Epaphroditus

Paul talks about the loyalty of friends and the willingness of those close to us to look out for one another. In this case, Timothy and Epaphroditus are the types of friends that take care of those close to them.


Comprehension Questions

Does anyone have any questions about the story?


Who led the fight against the Amalekites? (Joshua)
Who were the Amalekites descendants of? (Esau)
What did Moses do during the fight? (hold his hands up, holding the staff of God)
What do you remember about Moses' staff from a previous story? (God turned Moses' staff into a snake to prove that he sent Moses - see Exodus 4)
What happened when Moses lowered his hands? (Amalekites were winning)
Who supported Moses' hands when he got tired? (Aaron and Hur)
What did Moses do after they defeated the Amalekites? (built an altar to God)


Closing

Moses had to completely surrender himself to God’s plan for the battle. We too need to surrender ourselves to God.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Do not depend on your own understanding. Proverbs 3:5


Prayer

Lord, we thank you for giving us an example of a faithful servant in Moses. We know he wasn’t perfect as none of us are, but help us to surrender our lives to you as he did. We thank you for our friends and family who are there to help us when we are tired and weak. But most of all, we thank you for your perfect son, Jesus Christ, who paid the price for our sins. It is in His name that we pray and give thanks. AMEN.

The End

“The End” - Mark 13:1-13 - Audio - Video

Last week, Pastor Bill talked about Salvation from Hebrews. He said it means to be redeemed, to be delivered from the consequences of our sin through faith in Jesus Christ.

To continue on that subject today there is a past, present, and future aspect to our Salvation. The past happened when Jesus Christ died on the cross and paid the penalty for our sin. The present occurs now, we are no longer under the power of sin. We have an advocate to strengthen us through our trials and temptations. And finally, the future. One day we will be removed from the presence of sin when we are in our eternal home.

Today’s Scripture from the book of Mark continues to look at the future and is directed to the disciples. This is a passage that's not easy to fully understand or interpret. Such passages have been the basis for a lot of books, sermons, and teachings on the end times. We need to approach them with caution, not making them say things we want them to say and mean. Of course, this is always true with the Bible, or should be for us.

Jesus and his disciples are leaving the temple or passing by it at least. Someone comments to Jesus about the beauty of the temple. Built by Herod the Great, it was magnificent. It had marble pillars some forty feet tall. It had elaborate stone work, engraved by the most skilled stone cutters and craftsmen. Gold all around it. In the entrance to the Temple was carved an intricate cluster of grapes, symbolizing Israel as the people of God. They were awe-struck by it, but not Jesus. He had already wept over the city (see Luke 19:41-44).

He somberly says, "The days are coming when this temple will not be left standing, not one stone on top of another." We know that day did come in AD 70 when Rome destroyed the temple and most of Jerusalem.

Jesus saw where the misplaced religious zeal and nationalism would lead his people. Even their views of the Messiah were greatly shaped by such concerns, for they wanted a military messiah, one to overthrow the Romans and set up Israel as the great kingdom it had been under David - and greater than that!

A magnificent temple, filled each day with many people and impressive rituals would not save them. The One who could save them was in their midst but only to be himself a temple they would seek to destroy. The irony here is that you may recall that one of the chief charges brought against Jesus when he was brought to trial is that he predicted the
destruction of the temple, taking it to mean by some that he and his followers would do it.

The disciples, always ready to ask the wrong questions at the wrong times, want to know more about all of this, especially when it will happen (vs 3-4).

Jesus begins by warning them that many will try to lead them astray when they ask and seek answers to such questions. Teachers and false messiahs will come in his name (claiming to be sent by him to try to get their support and following) claiming that they have superior knowledge of the end times, even to the point of saying that it is near
or here's a sign that surely means it is near. Jesus simply and bluntly says, "Do not go after them." In other words, don't listen to them. They don't know what they're talking about.

So Jesus warns about those persons who claim to know far more than they possibly can about such things. Uncertain times cause some people to look for messiahs, for persons to reassure them, to lead them. But then he goes on to say that there are some things that must happen before that time comes. It will not come right after the fall of the temple that he has just predicted. Neither will it come when they are hearing about wars and rumors of wars. They are not to let such idle talk and speculations terrify them. The end is still not yet (vs 7).

Jesus says before the end there would be great conflicts between nations (vs 8) and would even influence the natural world. But still this was not the end.

He warns them that far from being taken up to Heaven in the rapture, they will suffer. They will be arrested, persecuted, and tried (just like what was about to happen to him). Still this was not the end. Such times, Jesus says, you are not to seek to be delivered from but see as opportunities to speak on behalf of God's kingdom and will (recall how Jesus used his own trial to do that).

He seeks to reassure them that when those days come God will be with them, God will give them the courage and the words they need to make a good defense and witness. (Just recall some of the stories in Acts about how the disciples did just this when brought before the authorities, who were often astounded that these were just unlearned
individuals and how bold they were).

Jesus warns them that they would be hated because of their faith, because they go and live by his name. But in the end they were in God's hands and the authorities, as powerful as they were, could not finally harm even one hair on their heads (as elsewhere Jesus had assured them that God had numbered every hair on their head - see Luke 12:7). They
could kill the body, as they would with Jesus, but that was not the end of him, was it? They tumbled his temple but in three days God raised it up!

Note how Jesus ends: "By standing firm you will gain life." Continue to work, to serve, to be faithful. Do not become distracted by those who would mislead you, even coming to you in my name. Keep focused on the work at hand.

The FUTURE is a major theme in our scripture today and the emphasis is on faithfulness in the midst of present troubles, not letting speculations about the future or the troubles of the present distract from the responsibilities of the present.

This still applies to us today. So often we get caught up in the minor troubles and annoyances in our lives, that we forget why we are here, which is to simply glorify God with all that we say and do. We have God’s Word, we know what the future holds. We simply need to continue in faithfulness.

Just talking about the future or prophesying the future is not living our lives out in faith. Trusting in a God who holds the future in his hands is how we live by faith. Jesus told us to BE READY. Jesus wants us to live out our faith.

Faith does not believe that God will make our lives comfortable and affluent. Faith knows that whatever situations we face God will be with us through those situations. Faith is not worrying about the future. Faith is believing and trusting God’s plan and carrying out His will for your life.
So when our circumstances shift from comfort to discomfort; when our world moves from certainty to uncertainty; and when perhaps even friends and family turn against us, these are not reasons to reject God or to cease to believe in him. They are the opposite. They are times to remind ourselves that Jesus predicted these events. They are times to stand firm.

Another theme running through the whole chapter is that of being alert and watchful. Verse 5 “watch out”, verses 9 and 23, “be on your guard”, verse 33, “be on guard, be alert”, and verses 35 and 37, “keep watch”.

Will Jesus return? Is He coming back? He said he will! He is coming back. Before that day, he’s told us what to expect. Jesus calls us to be alert, and not to worry even if circumstances are awful.
We need Jesus to stay on the right path and to live a full life! Let me give you an example.

Many years ago, the actor Charlton Heston had to learn how to drive a chariot with four horses for his part in the movie Ben Hur. He explained to an interviewer that after many weeks of chariot lessons he told the director, “I think I can drive the chariot all right but I’m not at all sure I can actually win the race.” The director, responded,” You just stay in the race and I’ll make sure you win.”

Today, Jesus asks us to stay in the race of life no matter what happens to us. And Jesus Christ promises us that as long as we are with Him …we will win the race of life. So the challenge for us this week is simply this. The disciples learned to live their faith one day at a time. Let us follow their example and the example of countless Christians who have gone before us—trusting, loving, serving—never knowing if this is our last day or not, but being assure that no matter what God is with us.

Applying what we’ve learned:

1. God has a glorious Kingdom waiting for us. He will be back to take us to the place he has prepared and to judge those whom have not accepted His gift of salvation. If you haven’t accepted Christ as Lord and Savior of your life, do it today. Don’t wait.

2. Whatever our current situation is, we are to remember why we are here. We are to glorify God. We are to go into all the world and spread the Gospel message. The best tool for spreading the Gospel is your life. Does it honor and Glorify God? Can people tell you are a Christian by the way you talk and act?

3. Remember, no matter how bad things get for us, and we know persecution will come to Christians before Christ returns, we are not to give up hope. Christ died for our sins and will be back for us.

4. Keep on living the spirit-filled life. We cannot simply sit around and wait for the rapture. We were put here to do a job, so lets do it to honor and glorify God.

Closing Prayer
Merciful God, we come before you this day as those who are often afraid to confess all the many ways in which we have disappointed and betrayed You. You have given us continual opportunities to serve and love others, but we have withdrawn into lives of selfishness and greed. We have turned our backs on others in need. We have denied the gifts you have given us. Your voice calls to us to come home, to come to you unafraid, to receive forgiveness and healing. Open our hearts this day to receive these magnificent blessings. Help us understand the many ways in which you love us, and help us share that love with all those whom we meet. For we ask this in the name of Jesus Christ. AMEN.

Merry Christmas or Happy Holiday’s?

Merry Christmas or Happy Holiday’s?

With “Black Friday” a few days away, many people are preparing for Christmas. Some will wish you a Merry Christmas, others simply say Happy Holiday’s.

So as not to offend anyone, some companies do not allow their employees to wish people a Merry Christmas, but are allowed to say Happy Holiday’s. Often times, this offends the Christian’s that want to keep Christ in Christmas.

But what does it really mean when you say Merry Christmas or Happy Holiday’s?

Literally Christmas means Christ’s Mass. Merry comes from the word Murg which means brief or short. Merry as defined today means joyful or cheerful. So have a cheerful Christ’s Mass.

How about Happy Holiday’s?

Happy comes from the word Hap, which means, by chance, fortune, or good luck. Holiday literally means Holy Day.

So whether you say Merry Christmas or Happy Holiday doesn’t really matter. Both have religious significance.

Thanksgiving is a Holy Day where we should give thanks to God for the things He has given us, is doing for us, and will do for us.

Christmas is a Holy Day where we should give thanks to God for the salvation He has given to us through His Son Jesus Christ.

New Years is a Holy Day where we should give thanks to God for another year of life and ask Him for continued blessings and His presence in our lives for the new year.

So the next time someone says Happy Holiday’s to you, rather than saying Merry Christmas, simply say, “Thank You, and I hope you too have happy holy day’s ahead as well.”