Jesus our Foundation

Jesus Our Foundation

 Everything in this life is given a ‘Second Chance’. It might have been hidden away or worse, about to be thrown away.  Now it can be useful to you.

Those of us who are committed Christians know what it’s like to be given a ‘Second Chance’ in life.  We can tell you what it is like to be born again and how you can be too.  ‘Born again’ is a Christian expression and this happens when God gives someone a second chance, but this time with all of His love and power inside them to make life worth living.

When no-one else can help, Jesus can!

Love for Jesus and faith in Him brings forgiveness for all the mistakes of the past, healing for today, and hope for tomorrow.

There is only one way to heaven, but over a million ways to hell. John 14:6 “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me.” Yet people teach that there are many ways to God – no there are not. They tell you that being a Christian is easy – no it’s not – but it’s not too hard either. They tell you there is no hope for your future – yes there is – His name is Jesus. He has a plan for your life that He made before the beginning of time.

The greatest sin we can commit is, “I can manage my life without Jesus.”

Jesus is our total and complete foundation. We believe that He came, he died, he rose again. He conquered hell. He is the way, He is the truth, and He is the life. No one will ever promise you to give your life to Jesus and every problem will be solved. You will still have problems. You may still be out of work. You may still be broke. But, Jesus will help you, He will be there for you, Holy Spirit will teach you and lead you. Jesus is the rock, the foundation on which He built His church.

Why do I tell you all this? I just want to encourage you all to trust your life to this same Jesus and through Him, to give yourself a hope for your future, eternal life, and to get your name in heaven – in ‘the Lambs Book of Life’.

Hearts in the Balance

Our Heart in the Balance

Proverbs 21:2 “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the heart.”

How weighs your heart in God’s scales? His balance is pure and just – how does your heart measure up to God’s standard? I know mine doesn’t do very well at all.

We all make plans for the future but sometimes we make those plans with God and sometimes we make them without Him. Sometimes we make the plans on our own and sometimes God gives us the plans. The problem with our own plans is that they rarely match Gods plans for us. That is when they fail and, frequently, that’s when we blame God and ask Him why they didn’t work.

The problem with our own plans is that our motives are all too often plain wrong. Our heart is out of kilter with God’s heart so our motives are out of kilter too. As Proverbs says, “Every way of a man is right in his own eyes, but the Lord weighs the heart.” The Lord knows our motives and our agenda every time we open our mouth to speak – He knows us before we speak.

If we were to make this our daily prayer, then perhaps, we would spend less time analysing ‘What went wrong?’ Psalm 51:10-11 “Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me. Do not cast me away from Your presence, And do not take Your Holy Spirit from me.”

Bringing our heart into line with God’s standards is a priority for all of us. As Paul said, so we need to echo, “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” Galatians 2:20

I look at my own heart and find it wanting. What must God see?

The Value of Relationships

The Value of Relationships

Some dear friends of ours recently took a photo of my wife and I. Actually, it was a really good one and we shared it on Facebook. One of the comments we got back surprised us – well it surprised me anyway. “Your relationship is something lots of folks envy.”

Whoa there – rewind that a minute. “Your relationship is something lots of folks envy.”

Made me start thinking – often a dangerous activity for me !  We met just a little over three years ago. Our position was absolutely impossible. I was living just outside London in England and travelling a lot while my wife was working in a hospital in Fort Worth, Texas. I was “retired” – I use that term loosely – while she was fully committed to the Harris Methodist Hospital in Texas. According to Google maps, there were 4861 miles between us. We thought we were just FB friends and we thought no more about it. Until God intervened that is.

The short story is that, without meeting, we fell deeply in love and I proposed to here via a telephone call within 3 weeks !!! We married in November 2010 in Texas and had a church blessing here in the UK 10 days later. We have been unbelievably happy ever since. We have been ‘adopted’ by younger Christians as their spiritual Mum & Dad as the Lord has opened doors for us here in the UK.

The point is that, without “working at it” very much, we treasure our love and our relationship with both each other and with the Lord. Somehow, this must show through for others to pick up and latch on to. The Lord seems to be developing a ministry for us both individually and together in helping others develop their own relationships. Not that we have sought anything. All we have done is waited on the Lord for Him to show us where next to plant our feet.

With so many relationship breakdowns these days, I have to ask if we treasure the really important ones enough? Are we as selfless in those relationships as we are selfish in others? Does our relationship with God outweigh all others, or do the others outweigh our relationship with God? Don’t get me wrong – our relationships with each other are far from perfect, but we do actively seek to keep them strong. God gave us the gift of love for each other. The least we can do is to treasure those relationships and work on them so as to give Him some glory from them.

That way we have a chance of reflecting some of God’s love for us into others lives.

God with us

Immanuel - God With Us

The story of Elisha trapping the ‘blinded’ Arameans in 2 Kings 6:8-23 is a good read. It also has much to teach us. There he was, king of Aram (Syria), the world at his feet. The last barrier to his local world domination was that pesky bunch, Israel. The king declares war on Israel but all does not go according to plan.

He sets traps here, lays ambushes there, plans skirmishes all over. Yet every time he makes a plan, Israel counters it easily and quickly. Poor old king is furious. He accuses one of his own of spying for Israel and leaking all his plans. His generals were probably terrified at this – whoever did this was in for the chop – literally.  Head off, family cast out, not a good prospect. Then a brighter than average spark remembers that Israel has a prophet – a seer in their terms – one who sees things.

Imagine the kings fury at being told, “Elisha, the prophet who is in Israel, tells the king of Israel the very words you speak in your bedroom.’” Don’t discount this. The people of this time were very accustomed to the supernatural and could probably teach us a thing or two about it too. The king ordered Elisha to be brought before him. “Elisha is in Dothan.” “Send a large troop to capture him and bring him to me,” ordered the king. Off they went, a fair-sized army contingent, all to capture one man.

When they arrive, Elisha is not in the least concerned and he shows his frightened servant why this is so. God had protected them with the Lord’s army – the horsemen and chariots of Israel. Elisha prayed for the Arameans to be ‘blinded’ – not literally but blind to where they were. He then led the whole lot of them into captivity. Then, amazingly, he showed them great kindness and mercy by feeding them and sending them back whence they came.  The king of Aram was not a complete idiot. Realising that Israel had weapons he knew nothing about that would defeat him in a trice, he gave up his quest, made peace and they all went home safely.

The point of all of this is to show us that whatever our position, with God on or side, we can know our enemy, we will defeat our enemy at very little cost to ourselves. God showed that He was with Israel in an unmistakeable way. He told them of the enemy plans. He warned them of the approaching armies. He confused the enemy and provided amazing supernatural protection for Israel. He captured the enemy without a drop of blood spilled in anger. Then He showed his mercy to the “sinners” by looking after them and returning them all safely to their own loved ones.

The story brings a whole new meaning to “Immanuel - God With Us” doesn’t it? To me, it shows the Trinity at work long before we knew or comprehended the term ‘Trinity’. Long before Jesus came, He was here among us, working with Holy Spirit to protect us in accord with the Father’s will.

Hallelujah – wonderful glorious God \o/

Where is God today?

Where is God?

When Elijah was taken up into heaven and Elisha was left on his own, Elisha thought on the final request he had made of his old master.  2 Kings 2:9 “And so it was, when they had crossed over, that Elijah said to Elisha, “Ask! What may I do for you, before I am taken away from you?” Elisha said, “Please let a double portion of your spirit be upon me.”

Even on the basis of “If you don’t ask, you don’t get”, that is a bit of a tall order. I mean, after all was said and done, Elijah had a powerful anointing. So I imagine it was with mixed feelings that Elisha turned back towards the river once more. “I asked for a double anointing – he said that if I saw him go – I saw him go - “Where now is the Lord God of Elijah?” 2 Kings 2:14 The rest, as they say, is history.

Many times in our lives, we question like Elisha, “Where now is the Lord God of Elijah?” We may not use those exact words but that is the sentiment behind our questioning. Stuff happens. We don’t like much of the stuff that happens. We question God. “Where are you? Where were you? Where will you be next?” What a cheek we sometimes have. Questioning God and calling Him to account? What arrogance!

We forget that we live in a fallen world and the Prince of this world is  Satan, the enemy, the devil – call him whatever you will. God can only be there with us in everything if we give Him permission to be there. Forgetting to commit ourselves to Him in a particular course of action does not obligate Him to say ”Well, they meant to ask my protection.” No, no, no – we need to commit every action of every day to Him. We need to do everything we do as if we do it for Him – personally. We need to commit everything we do before Him in prayer – before we start doing it.

That way, and only that way, we can look back and thank God. We can look forward and trust God. We can look around and serve God. Then perhaps we can look within and find God. I don’t mean this at all tritely.

·        When we can look back we can see God’s hand upon our situation; how He used everything for our good; and how we came through it all with His help. That’s when we can really thank God.

·        We can look forward, remembering what He has done in the past and knowing His provision and protection in everything. That’s when we know we can trust God.

·        With a grateful heart, we can then look around, see the need, and serve God.

·        And having done all these things, we can look within our hearts and find God. He’s almost certainly been there all the time, but we haven’t been listening like we should.

All He wants is a two way conversation with us. It’s not a bad way to do everything is it? All we are doing is seeing God’s will and purpose for us and following His gentle leading.