Thought of the Day !!

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.

                                       John 14:27 (TNIV)

There is a difference in the peace that we get from the world and the peace we receive from Christ.  The world's idea of peace is the absence of conflict.  But there will always be conflict in a sinful world.  

Jesus' gift of peace is what gets us through not only the good times, but also those times of conflict.  When you have a sick child…when you're stressed over your job…when you aren't sure how the bills will get paid, these are times when we don't think about peace.  That is, unless we seek it from the only one who can give it without any strings attached.

When speaking of this verse of scripture in his Explanatory Notes on the New Testament, John Wesley wrote these words.

"Lord, evermore give us this peace!  How serenely may we pass through the most turbulent scenes of life, when all is quiet and harmonious within!  Thou hast made peace through the blood of the cross."  

This is the peace of Christ…when no matter what's going on outside, there is quiet and harmonious within.  Do not let your hearts be troubled.  Do not let them be afraid. 

Do you know this kind of peace today?  Do you truly feel that you'll be taken care of in a dangerous situation?  Can you take the laughter or jabs or innuendos of unbelievers when you stand up for what's right or share Christ with them?  When someone has brought you pain can you allow yourself to be healed within from the One who created you?

May you have the peace of Christ with you today and forevermore.

In the love of Christ,

greg

Thought of the Day !!

Nothing outside a man can make him 'unclean' by going into him. Rather, it is what comes out of a man that makes him 'unclean.'

                                     Mark 7:15 (NIV)

Man or woman...it doesn't matter.  What he or she eats...it doesn't matter.  What's on the inside...Now that's what matters.  Filthy mouths that spew venom cannot come from a clean loving heart.  There may be mistakes made with the mouth, for as James says,"...no man can tame the tongue.  It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison."  But when hateful things constantly come from this mouth, it means that the heart is filled with more selfishness and/or hate than love.  On the other hand, a mouth that is constantly lifting people up means that the heart is filled with love.  Which do you have?

In the love of Christ,

greg

Thought of the Day !!

For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.

                                        2 Corinthians 4:17-18 (NIV)

We see many things in this world from the beauty of creation to the ugliness that we can make of God's creation.  We also see struggles; ours and other people's.  

But the fact is that none of these things will last forever.  There will come a day when our eyes will be opened to unimagined beauty.  We will experience things in a whole new way; a way that won't be troubling anymore.  

We have a choice in life of whether or not to accept this future.  When we place our hope and trust in Christ Jesus, coming into a relationship with God, we will be fixing our eyes on what is unseen, eternal and perfect.  It's this hope that can get us through any temporary troubles that come our way.  

Be blessed with the hope of salvation today as Christ abides in you through the power of the Holy Spirit.

In the love of Christ,

greg

Thought of the Day !!

But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness.

                                1 John 1:9 (NLT)

Forgiveness.  It might not be something we think about on a daily basis, but is something we need so badly.  If a friend or family member holds a legitimate grudge over us for something we've done or said, it will affect us more than we can know.  This is because it affects us deeply in the heart.  We might try to outwardly hide it or inwardly wish it away, but it continues to hurt us.  It's painful because we know what we did was wrong.  We know that we would love to take it back, but can't go back in time.  And we know that we can't control the person that we've harmed to make them forgive us.  We can apologize.  We can try to make amends.  But we cannot control the situation.

We've all sinned according to Paul in Romans.  None of us has been the perfect child to God.  We've been selfish and prideful.  We've struggled to obey His commands. We've placed something in our lives before Christ.  We might be guided by His love and seek to love others, but there will simply be times when we will fail.  And when we are in love with our Savior, our Father in Heaven, the Spirit that resides in us, we pain ourselves when we have let Him down.  

That's where forgiveness comes in.  No matter what we've done or how far we've gone, God's love goes farther and reaches deeper.  We cannot out-sin God's forgiveness.  He says if you love me you will obey me.  He also points out that when we fail to obey, we can repent (or change).  Part of what makes this repentance genuine is confession.  Confession shows that we know we are wrong as well as being the beginning of our own healing.  When we confess, God forgives.  He begins the healing process.  He brings us back under his wings and tells us that what we've confessed is no more.  

In the love of Christ,

greg

Thought of the Day !!

A spiritual gift is given to each of us so we can help each other.

                               1 Corinthians 12:7 (NLT)

Have you ever wondered if you had any particular gifts or talents for ministry?  If so, you're not alone.  Several people over the course of my ministry have come to me and shared this feeling.  As a matter of fact, before I was called into ministry, I felt the same about myself.  I'm not good with my hands, so every time we worked on Habitat Houses I was used to clean up.  I had a terrible stage fright, so public speaking was out of the question (or so I thought - God showed me I guess).  I couldn't play the piano or sing.  So I felt pretty down about my giftedness, thinking that He may have simply passed me by when He was passing out talents that could be used for ministry. 

But in reality we are all gifted for something.  A spiritual gift is given "each" of us.  You may have the gift of never meeting a stranger.  Maybe your gift is the simple gift of listening to people when others don't have the time or inclination do do so.  Maybe your gift is the gift of encouragement or joy or giving or teaching or hospitality or working behind the scenes without recognition.  The list can go on and on.  But just remember that we all have gifts so that "we can help each other."   

Let me end with a story that Pastor Robert Schuller once wrote.   

A man once had a dream.  In his dream he died and a guide took him to a large room.  The room had a very large banquet table filled with different kinds of foods, and there were hungry people seated all around this table.  The problem was that they were all five feet apart and pushed away from the table.  Their arms were not long enough to reach the table and they were unable to rise from their chairs. 

As the man looked more closely, he saw a very large spoon that was five feet long that the people were fighting over.  In his dream, he watched with amazement how one person used the spoon to dish up some food and then carefully turned the spoon around toward his mouth with all the food falling off the spoon and onto the floor.  Then another person grabbed the spoon but was unable to feed himself because of the length of the spoon. 

Then the man turned to the guide and said this must be hell.  And the guide said, "You are correct.  It is.  But this is not the place for you."  He then led him to another room exactly like the one he had just seen, with a table and chairs and people five feet apart.  This room also had a single spoon, which each person took turns dishing up food from the table and turning and feeding each other.  The guide looked at the man and said, "This…is Heaven." 

The genius of God's plan is that He created each of us to serve one another so that each would be served, and each would be fulfilled by serving. 

In the love of Christ,

greg