Pluck?

I get a success newsletter in my email but for the several few months it has been going into my spam folder.  To be honest – it has been a long time since I read it – even before it started going to my to my spam.  I had a moment to read it and really felt led to read, so I did and I am glad I did.  So, I am copying it for you to read.  Please read and enjoy.

Pluck, Not Luck! – – by Bill Mansell

James was born in 1875 on a small farm in Missouri, the seventh of twelve children in a poor family. His father was a minister, and the children were taught hard work, honesty, self-reliance, and discipline. Although he worked hard on the farm, and studied in school, James had every reason to believe that his opportunities were limited. When he was 20, his father died and James began working as a salesman at the local dry goods store in Hamilton. Times were difficult and the other salesmen were often cruel to him. But he persevered.

When he was 22, James moved to Denver where he purchased a butcher shop. He was determined to treat each customer fairly. When he refused to give special treatment to a powerful few, they retaliated and his business failed. Undeterred, he went to work at another dry goods store, called the Golden Rule store. Soon he was a partner and, in 1902, opened his own Golden Rule store in Wyoming. It was a small, one-room store with the family’s living quarters in the attic. James offered fair prices and great service to everyone, which made the store successful. In 10 years, there were thirty-four Golden Rule stores throughout the west.

Personal tragedy struck James in 1910 when his wife died of pneumonia, leaving him with two sons. At the time, he wrote that his “world crashed” around him. He married again 9 years later, only to have his second wife pass away after only four years, leaving him with another son. In spite of these personal setbacks, James was determined to carry on.

James bought out his partners and renamed the Golden Rule stores after himself. He hired and trained “associates” whom he developed into successful manager-partners. Each manager, was to then find another honest, hardworking person and train them to manage another store. Using this formula, the company thrived. By 1924, there were 500 stores, and by 1929, 1400 JC Penneys stores were in operation.

The stock market crash of 1929 left James in personal financial ruin, but he was determined to keep his stores alive. He borrowed against his life insurance policies to help the company meet payroll and successfully survive the great depression. In 1946, with his business on solid footing, James retired from day-to-day management of the company, but continued to be active and involved, going to his office daily until well into his 90′s.

At the age of 92, James was asked by a newspaper reporter the secret to his success. “I don’t believe in luck,” he said, “Put a P in front of it!” Pluck means living with courage and resolution. It means refusing to give up. It means believing in yourself and your vision in spite of opposition or adversity. “My eyesight is impaired…” he continued, “but my vision is stronger than ever.”

Success Tip: Next time you feel that adversity has beaten you down, think of James Cash Penney. Don’t worry about luck, just put a P in front of it and forge ahead.

I did not know this story about JC Penny and it got me thinking.  Sometimes we want to give up or give in.  Sometimes things happen and we feel like it is going to crush us and we want to quit.  When I read this and all I could think about is perseverance.  We need to be a people who preserver through life!

Meditate on this today: ³ Not only so, but we also glory in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; ⁴ perseverance, character; and character, hope. ⁵ And hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. (Romans 5:3-5).

What are your thoughts on the story?  How are you with perseverance?  By the way – Pluck really does mean to live with courage and resolution.

Words, Whipped Cream, and Encouragement

Words are very powerful, aren’t they? The children’s adage is incorrect when it says sticks and stone may break my bones but names will never hurt me. We all know that a casual sarcastic remark or a critical remark can inflict a lasting injury but a well-timed compliment can inspire for a lifetime. How often do you think about the words you say to other people?  The words you say to others are important and powerful and because of this we need to be mindful of them on a daily basis.

Ephesians 4:29 – Let no unwholesome word proceed from your mouth, but only such a word as is good for edification according to the need of the moment, so that it will give grace to those who hear. Let us break down just the beginning of this verse. The word “unwholesome”, it means rotten, unfit for use, bad, and worthless. Then we have ”word”  which here is talking about speech. So what this verse is saying is, do not let speech come from your mouth that is rotten, bad, unfit, or worthless. What should come from your mouth are things that build up and encourage others. Replace the worthless speech with worthwhile speech. Poorly chosen words can kill enthusiasm, impact self-esteem, lower expectations and hold people back. Well-chosen words can motivate, offer hope, create vision, impact thinking and alter results all for the positive.

Let me give you an illustration. If I spray out whipped cream on a plate, who can get it back in the can? You cannot get it back in – once it is out it is out. Whipped Cream is just like our words – once they are out, they are out. This is one reason why we must be so very careful about the word we use.  We need to be careful to use our words in a positive way.  Let me give a side note that will make sense over the various post and that whipped cream taste sweet and good  when used the right way but can make real mess when it is not used like it is intended..

Now think about this: The Power of Positive Words – Words that build up others, lift up others, or move others higher than they were. Those are the words we need to find and use in life. Let us all be honest, we all love to be around people who build us up. Think now about someone who is uplifting every time they speak to you, I am sure that someone has come to your mind.Now think about this: do you come to other people’s minds when they think about people who speak positive words into their lives? Are you using the power of positive words? Are your words ones that lift people up higher than where they were?

People will as the old commercial says “judge you by the words you use”.This is not whether they are big or small words as the commercial leads you to believe but I believe people will judge you by the positive or negative words you use when you speak to them – if you gossip or if you encourage – your words make a difference.

I mentioned a moment ago that whipped cream is certainly sweet. Most people love to eat whipped cream on things because of the sweetness. That is what positive words are; they are sweet to the taste! People love them.

I am one who likes to people watch and people listen. It does not take long to sit somewhere and hear people talking and hear someone say unkind things about someone else. You turn on the Television and you hear people putting down others. Unfortunately you can go to church and hear other Christians being unkind to others. The Bible tells us that our words should not be unkind but kind.

Kind words – They are words that are generous, good, considerate and helpful.

Proverbs 16:24 – Kind words are like honey – sweet to the soul and healthy for the body. Kind word should be the words that come across your lips on a daily basis. Notice that they are sweet like whipped cream. Kind words are something that should define us as Christians. The words we use should be the most generous, the most considerate, and the most helpful to all people. Don’t you just feel better when someone says something that is kind to you? What is it that we say to someone who is having a terrible day; we say sweet things to them, why? Because sweet things said help us to feel better and we understand that from this verse in Proverbs we just read.

Then we also have other words to say to people which are: Encouraging Words – These are words that inspire others with courage, spirit, or hope. 1 Thessalonians 5:11 -Therefore encourage one another and build up one another, just as you also are doing. Who are the encouragers in your life? Many of you who read this are great encouragers of me. When someone encourages me, it causes me to want to encourage others. That is what we need to be all need to be and that is encouragers!

We all need to be the ones encouraging.  Some might say that this is just dreaming but what I know is this: encouragement is a command of scripture. The idea of building up other people is one that is weaved throughout the Bible. Paul throughout his writing sends people to encourage churches. To the Colossians he sends Tychicus to be an encourager. He sends Timothy to be the encourager in Thessalonica. He sends people to encourage and he tells us to encourage. It is important that we are men and women who are pushing people to be full of courage. I want you to take a second and think back to the one person in your life who encouraged you the most when you were young. It might be a mother, father, grandparent, aunt, uncle, friend, coach, or whomever. They were a positive difference maker in your life. Do you come to anyone’s mind as a great encourager? There are people in my life who have encouraged me and believed in me and I would not be where I am today without them. I want to be that type of person to others and I would hope and pray that you would want to be that type of person too. If you do – act and speak like it!

Who was your encourager when you were young?  What did they encourage you to do?

Positive and the Best to Enjoy life

The last two posts have been about enjoying life and this post will continue along those lines.  Here are two more ways I think that we can enjoy the life we are blessed to have,

Thinking Right or on the positive side of Life – Phil 4:8 – Summing it all up, friends, I’d say you’ll do best by filling your minds and meditating on things true, noble, reputable, authentic, compelling, gracious–the best, not the worst; the beautiful, not the ugly; things to praise, not things to curse.  (Message)

What do you fill your mind with, things that positive or negative? Paul tells us for a reason to fill our minds with the positive. The positive brings about a better result!

Do negative people have great parties? When I was a kid I loved to watch the Honeymooners. Who would you have rather hung out with Ralph or Norton? Norton was a guy who loved life and lived it not worry about everyone else. We want to hang out with people who are fun and enjoy life like Norton. Not with people who constantly bring us down like Ralph.

Negativity and positively are both contagious – which are you spreading? Are you helping people to enjoy life or to dread life and fear everything?

What is your picture of God – Is he some Old guy up in heaven with rolled up newspaper waiting to slap you like a fly when you get out of line or is he a God who laughs, loves, and wants the same for his people. Do not misunderstand – God is Holy, Righteous and Just and He is also a God of Joy or enjoyment.

Your Thinking determines a lot. If you think that today will be joyful and enjoyable – most likely it will be but if you think it will be a drag then it will be.

So to enjoy life, a positive outlook is essential. That then moves us to the next thing we can do to enjoy this life.

Doing you best all the time for God – 1^st Corinthians 10:31 – So eat your meals heartily, not worrying about what others say about you–you’re eating to God’s glory, after all, not to please them. As a matter of fact, do everything that way, heartily and freely to God’s glory. ( Message)

You enjoy the things you work for more than the things given to you. You also get a real sense of satisfaction when you work hard. What is does it mean again to enjoy? Taking pleasure or satisfaction in something.

My first radio/cassette player was something I shoveled many sidewalks to get. I worked hard and did my best so that I could get it and I really got pleasure out of doing what was need to get it. I worked hard and kept it along time – as a matter of fact – I had a junkie car that I kept it in the back on the floor and played it all the time because my radio was broken. I had that thing for almost 20 years – I loved it – because I worked hard and did my best so that I could get it.

We should be doing our best because we always feel better when we have done the best we can – regret kills enjoyment. Live life with no regrets! You will never regret doing your best for God.

What do you think – do these areas help us to enjoy life more?  Do you lean to the positive or negative in your thinking?  How are you working to stay positive?  Do you always give God your best?

Enjoying Life and Boundaries

I discussed enjoying life in the last post and in this post I want to expand on how we can enjoy life and not complain.

How do we really enjoy life?  Here is one way:

Obey God’s commands – De. 4:40

If you obey all the laws and commands that I will give you today, all will be well with you and your children. Then you will enjoy a long life in the land the LORD your God is giving you for all time. – NLT

John 14:23-24 23 Jesus replied: If anyone loves me, they will obey me. Then my Father will love them, and we will come to them and live in them. 24 But anyone who doesn’t love me won’t obey me. What they have heard me say doesn’t really come from me, but from the Father who sent me. – CEV

To really enjoy life you need to know your boundaries. God’s commands give us a boundary. That way we know where we can and cannot go and what we can and cannot do. To know what your boundaries are is to know freedom. Do you understand that – let me say it again – to know what your boundaries are is to know freedom.

God is big on giving man freedom and boundaries- freedom to manage what He has entrusted to us, and with that then the boundaries are there to protect us from evil. The boundaries in the Garden of Eden were not set for the purpose of limiting Adam but to let him know what his freedom was. Adam got into trouble when he questioned those boundaries and so do we. God had provided everything Adam would need for life. He  entrusted Adam with responsibility to manage and work the Garden. God gave him freedom in that freedom came responsibility. God made us to express ourselves creatively through our work and he gave Adam that opportunity.

Each of us, in order to really be happy, must have freedom and boundaries in our  lives. Whenever you are hired for a job, you must have the freedom to make certain decisions in order to enjoy the job and be effective at it. You must have the authority to manage things within your area of expertise. You must also have limits within your area of responsibility. You need to know where those limits are and stay within them and in doing so will be enjoying what is it you do and you will be effective at what you do. The boundaries make you more effective.  In then making the connection back to God we need to understand that both freedom and boundaries are always under the umbrella of God’s authority in our lives and when we live in them we are able to enjoy life and be effective in it.

So to enjoy life,what we need to do is  live freely in the boundaries that God gives us. To know those boundaries you must know his Word and that is why imperative that you read the Word of God to learn what your boundaries are and to find the freedom that comes in the Word of God.  Are you doing that?  Do you know the boundaries that God gives in His Word to give us freedom? 

When you know who God is and what His commands are, it make a difference in life.  When you know where He has set the boundaries then it really should keep you from complaining. All of this should also help you to really enjoy all you have been blessed with in this life but does it?

So what do you think today?  Do you think that boundaries give you freedom?   Do you think complainers (us) are out of God’s boundaries when we complain?

Enjoying Life

I have been refreshed by my Christmas break from blogging.  I have enjoyed all my family and it has been awesome but now I am back and ready to blog away.  I pray you have had a great Christmas!

One of the things I hate to hear in life is complaining. It drives me crazy!  There are some people complain constantly and there is nothing ever right in their lives. They are many times people people who always have some sort of drama happening. There is always someone sick in their family or there is always a stressful situation going on at work with others around them, there is always something. The problem that I see here with these people is they do not realize that everyone has sick people in their families or stressful situations going on at work or around them. The fail to realize that there is always something for everyone. They fail to understand this and they miss out and fail to enjoy the life that they have been blessed with because their focus is all wrong.

As we start a New Year, I want to encourage you begin to enjoy your life. If you already enjoy it – I want you to enjoy it some more and if you do not enjoy it – I want you to see that it is a spiritual thing to enjoy life!

Let us begin this by looking at 1 Timothy 6:17, Instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy. -NAS

Do you see the word enjoy there at the end of the verse? Here is what enjoy means – taking pleasure or satisfaction in something.

In life we sometimes get stuck in faulty thinking and many times we always think we will really enjoy ourselves when…I turn 18, when I turn 21, when I turn 30, when I retire, when I make enough money, when I can afford that new car, when I can get that job, when I get that promotion, when I get married, when I have kids, when the kids move out, when I get the really good job and make a lot of money, when everything is perfect, when I….

We all have a tendency to think that with money, age, status, retirement, good health, fame, or a nice car will be that one thing that will brings us to the point where we will really then begin to enjoy life. So in many ways we think that life will be enjoyable later and think we really have nothing to celebrate in life now. We think things like,”There is nothing in my life that I can celebrate now but later I will be able to”. For many, this faulty thinking follows them through life.

Sometime the faulty thinking leads them down this line of thinking.  They think that enjoyment of life is sinful or wrong because we always have to be dead serious. They think that there can be no enjoyment in the church or life because that is wrong because Jesus never really enjoyed himself.

People when you talk about enjoying life on a daily basis ask questions like: Can you really enjoy everything?  Is everyday a celebration? Can everyday be a party?

Look at these verses from Ecclesiastes from a variety of versions and see what they say about the enjoying of life.

Ec 2:24 – Nothing is better for a man than that he should eat and drink, and that his soul should enjoy good in his labor. This also, I saw, was from the hand of God. – NKJV

Ec 2:25 – For who can eat or enjoy anything apart from him? – NLT

Ec 3:12 – So I concluded that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to enjoy themselves as long as they can. – NLT

Ec 3:13 – And people should eat and drink and enjoy the fruits of their labor, for these are gifts from God. -NLT

Ec 3:22 – We were meant to enjoy our work, and that’s the best thing we can do. We can never know the future. -CEV

Ec 5:18 – Here is what I have seen: It is good and fitting for one to eat and drink, and to enjoy the good of all his labor in which he toils under the sun all the days of his life which God gives him; for it is his heritage. – NKJV

Ec 7:14 – On a good day, enjoy yourself; On a bad day, examine your conscience…. – Message

I will spend more time this week talking about what it means to enjoy life but for now let me ask you these questions:

What are two things that you really enjoy in life?  Does complaining drive you crazy?  Have you ever been stuck in the  faulty thinking of “When I”?

The Virgin Birth

This time of year we celebrate the Virgin Birth of Christ.  One of the reasons we believe in the Virgin Birth has to do with the Old Testament prophecy in Isaiah 7:14 which says:  14 “Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, a virgin will be with child and bear a son, and she will call His name Immanuel.”  Then in the New Testament we have the fulfillment in Matthew 1:23 which says “Behold, the virgin shall be with child, and bear a Son, and they shall call His name Immanuel,” which is translated, “God with us.”  It is my belief that Matthew here is making a reference back to Isaiah 7:14 which is a good reason to understand that this is a prophecy about the coming Messiah who Matthew contents and whom I believe is Jesus.

So you might wonder today, what does this have to do with me? Sure the Bible in the Old Testament says in a prophecy that a virgin would give birth and then in the New Testament we see that Mary is a virgin and gives birth but again what does that have to do with me today in December of 2011? What difference does this make in my life.  Let me share with you five reasons why I feel this is important to us today.

First, the virgin birth was necessary to fulfill Old Testament prophecy that we looked at today. Isaiah 7:14 predicts that when the Messiah shows up, he will be born of a virgin. If a prediction is made in the Bible and it does not come true then it calls into question the whole Word of God. In other words, it helps us trust the validity of the Bible as being true which we see is the case here.

Second, the virgin birth emphasizes both Christ’s humanity and deity. Christ was both since He was the unique God-man. He was one hundred percent God and one hundred percent man. The fact that Christ was born of a woman and not a man which we see in Genesis 3:15 and Galatians 4:4 emphasizes His humanity, and the supernatural element of His virgin birth emphasizes His deity. So today we have in Jesus someone who is both God and man. Since Jesus is one hundred percent man he can understand what we go through in this life. Our God understand us.

Third, Christ’s virgin birth emphasizes His eternality. Christ has always existed. There never was a time in which He was not. Had Christ experienced a natural conception, He would have had a beginning point. Yet the eternal Christ had no beginning point. This means when we worship Christ, we are worshipping the eternal God, the only one who deserves our praise and worship. We are worshipping the One who was, who is, and is to come!

Fourth, the virgin birth was necessary in order to maintain Christ’s sinlessness. The Bible indicates that Christ was the only sinless man to ever live. If Christ had a biological father, then the sin nature, which is passed down to all of us, would also have been passed down to Him at the point of conception. Christ was conceived by the Holy Spirit and therefore the sin nature was not passed to Him. We have a sinless God whom we worship. We worship a perfect God!

Fifth, the virgin birth was necessary in order to protect Christ’s bodily atonement. Only an eternal God could pay the eternal penalty for man’s sin. Christ’s virgin birth protects His eternality. Also, only a perfect substitute could pay the penalty for man’s sin. God will only accept a perfect sacrifice in the place of the guilty which is all of us. Christ’s virgin birth protects His sinlessness. Therefore, the virgin birth protected both Christ’s eternality and sinlessness. Both of these elements are required for Christ to atone for the world’s sin debt. It affects us today because we who believe in Christ do not have to carry our sins around because Christ has atoned or died in our place. Christ the perfect one gave himself for us so that we could have eternal life!

The Virgin Birth is one of my favorite parts of the Christmas story and I see it as so important.  Here again is why I see it as so important: the Virgin birth shows us that the Bible is true, Christ understands us because he is one of us, Christ is the eternal God, Christ is perfect, and because he was virgin born he was able to die in our place for our sins. The Virgin birth makes all the difference in the world to us today!

What is your favorite part of the Christmas story?  Can you think of another reason that makes the Virgin Birth important to us in 2011?  

Insignificant?

When you think of Christmas and Jesus you will at some point will think about Bethlehem.  When you think of it, what do you think of and what about that baby that was born there?  I want to take a moment and look at the prophecy of the Messiah being born in Bethlehem and what that really means.

To start, look with me at Micah 5:2, “But as for you, Bethlehem Ephrathah, Too little to be among the clans of Judah, From you One will go forth for Me to be ruler in Israel. His goings forth are from long ago, From the days of eternity.”

The Messiah could have been born anywhere until this prophecy was made and then then only place that the Messiah could be born was in Bethlehem Ephrathah. What we see here is that the ruler who would be the Lord’s representative would arise from the comparatively insignificant town of Bethlehem. Bethlehem actually means House of Bread and Ephrathah actually means fruitful.  Something I find interesting is that when you think about the Messiah being born there and who the Messiah really is, which is the bread of Life and the one who would be the fruitful vine. Ephrathah was an old name for the district in which Bethlehem of Judah lay, in contrast to other Bethlehem’s in the Promised Land because there was more than one but Ephrathah distinguished it from the others.

Bethlehem was, of course, the hometown of David. It is interesting in the fact that David had been the least notable of his all his brothers but God choose to use him and so now we read that Bethlehem was the least honorable among the towns in Judah. The most insignificant son and the most insignificant place would bring forth the most significant person in all of human history. You might think that you are small and insignificant but understand that God uses in mighty and powerful way the small and insignificant. Will you allow God to use you today? Will you avail yourself to him so that He can do something mighty and powerful through you? God wants to use you regardless of how small you might think your faith is!

This ruler must be divine since the verse makes it clear that He had been conducting activities on God’s behalf from long ago, even eternity past which literally means since days of immeasurable time. The New Testament identifies this Ruler as the Messiah, Jesus Christ who was born in Bethlehem that first Christmas morning. Matthew 2:1 says this, 1 Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king.

This messianic prophecy not only gives the birthplace of Messiah, and therefore assures His humanity, but it also asserts His deity. No mere human could be said to have been carrying out the will of God eternally. The only one is Jesus Christ.

We do well to understand that Jesus was born in Bethlehem but we do miss out if we fail to take the time to really look at the end of this prophecy in Micah 5:2. Look at this phrase: His goings forth are from long ago, From the days of eternity. The glorious promise of all of Micah 5:2 was fulfilled in Jesus Christ, and Micah’s prophetic voice declares that though Jesus came from Bethlehem, He did not begin there but he has been goings forth from eternity past.

The Bible tells us that Jesus is the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End in Revelation 22:13. This means from the very beginning, Jesus was there. Know and understand that there was never a time when the Jesus did not exist. The baby born in Bethlehem always was – he was just being born as a human in Bethlehem but he has always been God!

Think about this some more, before Jesus was born in Bethlehem, He existed as the Second Person of the Trinity as we can read here in John 17:5 which says, Now, Father, glorify Me together with Yourself, with the glory which I had with You before the world was. This passage tells us that there was a relationship of love, fellowship, and shared glory that the Father and the Son shared in eternity past. The name “Jesus” was not known as a name for the Second Person of the Trinity until the angel Gabriel announced it to Mary, but the eternal Son existed before He revealed Himself as Jesus or Emmanuel or God with us.

Just think that long before Bethlehem, Jesus was the creator of all things as Colossians 1:16-17 tells us: For by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities–all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. Before that baby was born in Bethlehem he created everything that exists other than Himself. It is a powerful thought to think that the maker of Universe would come to Earth and be place in hay that he made and in manger made from wood from a tree that he made and then one day he would die on a cross made of wood which he created.

Do you have any thoughts on this today?  Have you ever felt insignificant and God used you?

Helping God Out?

When you look at the lineage of the Messiah you will see that He will come through the seed of Abraham but the question then is which of the two sons of Abraham will the line be passed.  Those who have been around the the Christian faith know the answer but take a moment to consider this. 

There are two places where you can read about which line the Messiah would come through.  One is in Genesis 17:17-19 which says: 17 Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed, and said in his heart, “Will a child be born to a man one hundred years old? And will Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child?” 18 And Abraham said to God, “Oh that Ishmael might live before You!” 19 But God said, “No, but Sarah your wife will bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him and then in Genesis 21:12 we read: But God said to Abraham, “Do not be distressed because of the lad and your maid; whatever Sarah tells you, listen to her, for through Isaac your descendants shall be named.

What we see  here is the lineage of Jesus. He is coming through Abraham and Abraham has two sons – which is he going to come through and why? Abraham’s response in Genesis 17:18 show that by this time, he was quite content with Ishmael as the promised son. He believed that Ishmael is the one that is promised. In 13 years, Abraham had grown quite attached to the boy. But God definitely rejects Ishmael and states that Sarah will bear Abraham a son and that this son will be the one with whom God will establish His covenant.

Why not Ishmael? Because Ishmael represented man’s effort helping God out. In Ishmael, Abraham could boast, because he was able to produce a son. But by the time Isaac came along, both Abraham and Sarah were humanly beyond their ability to reproduce. They could take none of the credit. All the glory went to God. God’s delay with Abraham and Sarah brought them to the end of themselves so that His grace got all the credit. If our proud flesh can grab any glory for itself, it will. That’s why God waits until we come to the end of ourselves many times to meet our needs – so we do not take credit.

Again, this is true of salvation. If we think that we can contribute anything to our own salvation, we’ll take the credit. If we think we came to Christ by our own free will, we’ll boast in our wise choice. If we think it was by our faith, we’ll boast in our great faith. If we think it was by our rational ability, we’ll boast in our great intellect. But if our salvation depends solely on God, and if God chose those who were foolish, weak, and despised, then no man can boast before God as Paul writes about in 1 Corinthians 1:27-31.

We can’t take any credit for our salvation if it is totally of God and not at all from us. In our flesh, we can produce an Ishmael and its good enough for us, but God doesn’t work that way. He wants to bring us all to the end of ourselves, and then He gives us Isaac as a free gift, so that we bow before Him, lost in wonder.

So when it comes to the lineage of Jesus he could not come through Ishmael who was of the flesh but had to come through Isaac who was of the Sprit and miraculous. We can see in in two places in the New Testament that Christ came through Isaac. We see it in Matthew 1:1-2 which says: The record of the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah, the son of David, the son of Abraham: It is also seen in Luke 3:34 which says: the son of Jacob, the son of Isaac, the son of Abraham, the son of Terah, the son of Nahor.

So for us we need to make sure this Christmas we are worshipping the one who came through the Spirit and miraculous line. We also need to make sure we are not trying to help God out in our flesh but allowing God to be God and do His God thing! Too often we want to help God along like Abraham did with Ishmael.

What is one way you have tried to help God out in life?

(I will be out almost all day so I will respond when I get a chance)

I Dare You!

Today I want to simply Dare You :

I DARE YOU!

I dare you to take positive risks for God.

I dare you to share your faith.

I dare you to read your bible everyday.

I dare you to pray everyday for other people as well as yourself.

I dare you to be a man or woman who daily takes risks for God!

I dare you to commit to being successful for God – You can do it.

I dare you to be passionate about God and the things of God.

I dare you to have clear goals and follow through with them.

You can do it – you can be someone great for God today.

Take the risk – I dare you.

What Risks Are You Going To Take Today?

Overflow with Gratitude or a Negative Attitude?

As I continue sharing about gratitude this week  I want to share some thoughts spawned by Colossians 2:7 which says: having been firmly rooted and now being built up in Him and established in your faith, just as you were instructed, and overflowing with gratitude.

In this I do not want you to miss this wonderful picture that Paul paints here. Do you see it? I love it and I want you to see it. We are to be cups that are being filled up with gratitude, but not just filled, filled and pouring over the sides. We are to overflow with gratitude. Our gratitude is to overflow out of us and splash all over those who are around us!  What at picture of how we are to be living regardless of what is happening in life.

The great Bible commentator, Matthew Henry, once was robbed as he walked along a highway. Afterwards he told his friends there were four things for which he gave thanks. First, he was grateful that he had never been robbed before. After many years of life this was the first time he had been robbed and for that he was grateful. Secondly, he said, “Though they took all my money, I am glad they did not get very much.” That was something to be thankful for. Thirdly, he said, “Though they took my money, they did not take my life, and I am grateful for that.” And finally, he suggested, “I am thankful that it was I who was robbed, and not I who robbed.”  This is a man who had learned how to be “overflowing with thankfulness!” He understood this: Don’t grumble because you don’t get what you want; be grateful that you don’t get what you deserve.

Let me be transparent here, I do not meet this one nearly as often as I should. I get caught up in what I do not have and begin to overflow with the negatives in life. I want to be known as someone who overflows with gratitude not a poor attitude. How about you? How would you say you are perceived – overflowing with gratitude or overflowing with a negative attitude? 

Who is the most positive and grateful person you know?  Have you told them how much you appreciate these qualities in them?