Walking Thoughts

And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests.  With this in mind, be alert always keep on praying for all the saints.
Ephesians 6:18

Be joyful in hope, patient in afflication, faithful in prayer.
Romans 12:12 

If you have any prayer requests please post them here as comments and they will be prayed over.  May God bless you richly as He answers your prayer!

Memorial Day is a day we set aside every year to remember the efforts and sacrifices made by our countrymen to ensure our freedoms in this nation. So often we forget that the men and women serving in our armed forces have made a choice. They have decided, the moment the need arises, to give up their lives so we can continue to live the lives we do. You may have not paid for the freedoms you enjoy today, but many have given their lives for it's cost. Today we all take some time to remember the sacrifice of all those who have and are currently serving.

GOD BLESS THE ARMED SERCVICES

"The putting away of our sins is indispensably necessary to the removal of God's judgements. This is the voice of every rod, it calls to us to return to him that smites us."

-- Matthew Henry

Yield not to temptation, for yielding is sin.
Each victory will help you some other to win.
Fight manfully onward, dark passions
      subdue.
Look over to Jesus, He'll carry you through.

Ask the Savior to help you,
Comfort, strengthen, and keep you.
He is willing to aid you--
He will carry you through.

-- H. R. Palmer

Have you ever tried to give something to somebody, but no matter what you did they wouldn't take it - even if you offered more than they could ever want? Who can give to somebody who is not willing to recieve? The good that could be theirs is withheld because, for whatever reason, they choose not to accept it. Such was the case for the Israelites.


If you read through Exodus you'll find how, time and again, God provided for their every need and moreover wanted to give them the promised land. He was giving it to them freely. All they had to do was accept it by faith. Yet they grumbled about their situation wishing they were back in Egypt where they had fish to eat (but were in bondage). When they came to the land that God wanted to give them, they did not go into it because they saw potential trouble and thereby did not accept God's promise of faithfulness. By their own choice of not accepting God's provision in thankfulness, the Israelites wandered the desert. They did not receive because they did not accept in faith. Notice also, that the Lord had still delivered them from bondage in Egypt; deliverance alone did not equate to reception of the promise.

In the same regard, we can be delivered from the eternal condemnation of hell but fail to receive the wonderful blessings Christ has for us today by not accepting to receive them. If you have accepted Christ into your heart, your eternal future is secure, but Christ wants to bless you so much more if you are willing to accept His will. Allow me to use the illustration of marriage. If one party in a potential marriage relationship sees something, in and of themselves (that is, something they dislike, not because it's unbiblical, but by taste), that they aren't willing to accept about the other, they will not extend the same grace that was given to them and neither party will receive the blessing of the marriage relationship. Now Christ has married himself to you, accepted all your faults, extended you grace and has received you. In faith, if you accept His provision, you will receive it.


When Jesus went to His own hometown, they did not accept Him and therefore did not receive His healing.


And he did not do many miracles there because of their lack of faith.
Matthew 13:58


God longs to give you good, but the question is, are you willing to receive?


Therefore the Lord waits to be gracious to you, and therefore He exalts Himself to show mercy to you. For the Lord is a God of justice; blessed are all those who wait for Him.
Isaiah 30:18

When you are at the end of your rope, God is there to catch you-but not before.
-- Erwin W. Lutzer

Two gas company servicemen, a senior training supervisor and a young trainee, were out checking meters in a suburban neighborhood. They parked their truck the end of the alley and worked their way to the other end. At the last house, a woman looking out her kitchen window watched the two men as they checked her gas meter.

Finishing the meter check, the senior supervisor challenged his younger coworker to a foot race down the alley back to the truck to prove that an older guy could outrun a younger one.

As they came running up to the truck, they realized the lady from that last house was huffing and puffing right behind them. They stopped and asked her what was wrong.

Gasping for breath, she replied, "When I see two men from the gas company running as hard as you two were, I figured I'd better run too!"

During a sermon I heard this past weekend, the pastor shared an illustration he used to explain the gospel to children.

He asked them what would need to be done to bring a dead person to life?  First, you would have to remove any disease, illness, or circumstance that was in that person killing him in the first place.  Since that would only remove the cause of death,  you would have to find a way to revive him and give him life.

In the same manner, Christ has done and is doing His work in us.  By dying on the cross for our sin, Christ took our disease, consequence and death of sin and poured it on Himself.  By giving us His Holy Spirit, He breathes life into us and revives us.

You could say, then, that receiving the gospel comes in two parts.  First, accepting in faith that the blood of Jesus has healed you from the eternal death and consequence of sin in whole.  Secondly, receiving the Holy Spirit to give you  life.  A dead man cleansed from disease is no more living than a dead man filled with disease.  Receiving life is where many a Christian falters, failing to live the overcoming life that God freely gives.  It's one thing to accept redemption, and another thing to accept revival through that redemption.

So often, especially in fundamentalist circles, we get so focused on the cross and Jesus' death that we either leave Him on the cross or leave Him in the grave!  If you associate yourself with Christ and are hanging out in an empty tomb or the cross, you are not walking with Him.  Don't get me wrong! It's at the cross we get forgiveness of sin and redemption, but it is through the cross that we get the life promised in being born-again!  If we stay at the cross or in the tomb, we are nothing more than dead men stripped of disease.  But if we follow and walk after Jesus through the cross we can be partakers of life in the power of His Holy Spirit.  Don't reject in fear or stubborness what Jesus wants to give you freely in love.

Jesus died to live again.  How contemptuous of us to only accept the first part of what He has done and not take part in the second!  If you have willfully died with Him, live with Him also in the same regard!!  Such is the path to being born-again in Jesus Christ. 

He said to them, "The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of men. They will kill him, and after three days he will rise."
Mark 9:31

We were buried therefore with Him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with Him in a death like His, we shall certainly be united with Him in a resurrection like His ... Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with Him.
Romans 6:4-5,8

I was walking down life's highway a long time ago. One day I saw a sign that read `Heaven Grocery Store'.

As I got a little closer, the door came wide open, And when I came to myself, I was standing inside.

I saw a host of angels. They were standing everywhere. One handed me a basket and said, "My child, shop with care." Everything a Christian needed was in the Grocery Store. And if you couldn't carry them, you could come back for more.

First I got some PATIENCE. LOVE was in the same row. Further down was UNDERSTANDING, you need that wherever you go.

I got a box of WISDOM, a bag or two of FAITH. I couldn't miss the Holy Ghost, for He was all over the place. I stopped to get some STRENGTH and COURAGE to help me win the race And though my basket was getting full, I remembered to get some GRACE.

I didn't forget SALVATION, for salvation, that was free. So, I tried to get enough of that to save both you and me. Then I started up the counter to pay the grocery bill, for I thought I had everything to do my Master's will.

As I went up the aisle, I saw PRAYER and I just had to put that in, For I knew when I stepped outside, I would run into SIN. PEACE and JOY were plentiful, they were on the last shelf. SONG and PRAISES were hanging near so I just helped myself.

Then I said to the Angel, "Now how much do I owe?"

He just smiled and said, "Just take them everywhere you go!"

Again I smiled at him and said, "How much do I really owe?"

The Angel smiled again and said, "My child, Jesus paid your bill a long time ago."

Two psychiatrists were at a convention. As they conversed over dinner, one asked, "What was your most difficult case?"

The other replied, "I had a patient who lived in a pure fantasy world. He believed that an uncle in South America was going to die and leave him a fortune. All day long he waited for a letter to arrive from an attorney. He never went out, he never did anything, he merely sat around and waited for this fantasy letter from this fantasy uncle. I worked with this man eight years."

"What was the result?"

"It was an eight-year struggle. Every day for eight years, but I finally cured him. And then that letter arrived!"