Life on Snow Hill

Hebrews 10:25:

Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.

Speaks for itself, right? I don’t believe I have ever met a church member that doesn’t know this verse by heart. Maybe I should say we all know it by memory. If we really knew it by heart, we might actually put it into more practice.

Fair warning – I’m telling the truth here. If you’re easily offended by blunt, honest truth, stop reading.

Yes, I’m going there. Church attendance. It seems to be the first thing that many people choose to forego when they need a day to do something fun. It appears to be the least important thing in many people’s lives, as they choose movies, ballgames (Yes, I went there, too), voluntary overtime, fishing, hunting…(shall I continue?) over church attendance.

My first reaction to this is to get angry. I’m working on this. But I get angry because these people know better. They’ve been taught the truth and know what’s right. They know not to skip church, but they do it anyway. It makes me want to grab ‘em by the shoulders and say, “Don’t you see what you’re doing??”

But then I think a little deeper about it. It has begun to break my heart. The anger isn’t as strong as it used to be, and here’s why. When someone can be at church and he or she makes a choice not to be there (circumstances completely within their control), I believe that person is responsible for and will be accountable for the truth that they would have heard had they been where they were supposed to be. They are hurting themselves eternally, and yet they can’t see it. My heart breaks for them. Mostly because I can’t do anything about it. I pray for them, and tell them the truth when I have the opportunity. But the choice is up to them.

What is more important? Seeing a movie that will be playing for weeks to come, yet has no spiritual significance and no eternal impact? Bouncing a ball up and down a floor that has a basket on each end that you try to throw that ball into? Catching the biggest fish? I’ve just picked a few of the most popular ‘excuses’. Insert your own here. Are these more important than the eternal impact that good, Bible preaching will have on your life? I think not…

God help us all to place the importance we should on meeting together in a good, Bible believing church to hear the man of God preach His Word.

Today’s daily verse is Philippians 4:8 – Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.

Every once in a while, I run across someone who simply wants to twist the Scripture to make it fit his or her lifestyle. Some try to use it to flaunt their ’super-Spirituality’ and highly educated self. Some totally ignore it so they can do the things they want and feel no conviction for it.

Some do all three.

This morning I was thinking about some of them. When I do that, I usually find myself getting angry and not fit for much for a while. Then I thought to myself, “Today is Sunday. I should be at my very best today.” Not that I should be any different today than I am any other day of the week – I certainly shouldn’t. I should live life the same every single day. I should be the same person every single day, whether it’s a Thursday, a Monday, or, yes, Sunday.

My point is, today is the Lord’s day, and I should find myself extra careful to keep my focus on the things of the Lord. Dare I say, the devil may try extra hard to get us off track on Sunday? Sure he does.

That’s when God reminded me of today’s verse – think on these things. Don’t worry about those other people. Stand for truth, for sure, but think on these things.

One small disclaimer. I couldn’t put the entire verse in my twitter status because I only get 140 characters. I’m not trying to change anything about what it says – promise!

I’ve severely neglected my blog again. I’m not going to keep much of a following that way, now am I? I’ve decided to try to do something about it. This something will serve two purposes for me.

1. My Bible reading and study habits will benefit. I’m taking other steps to improve this area of my life, as part of somewhat of a New Year’s resolution. But this will help to further that purpose in my life.
2. I’ll at least have something here daily. If it’s nothing more than a twitter update. Yes, that’s how I plan to post my daily verses, at least to begin with. If I feel compelled to expound on the verse, I’ll post about it here in my blog.

Today’s verse, that you should see over in the right column over there, is a large part of my motivation. Here’s why.

For the past few months, I’ve been realizing more and more that I don’t study like I should. I don’t read God’s Word like I should. I spoke to Becky about it a little, and told her what I’d been thinking about doing to improve this. She agreed that it would be a good thing to do. I thought about it a little more and decided that’s what I would do.

What’s that, you may ask? A way to help me improve my study habits in the Bible. A specific way to commit myself to it. I’m being purposely vague. I’m sorry, but that’s all you’re getting out of me. For now. Maybe later.

In church last Sunday Morning, the pastor read a verse as sort of a sideline thought to his main message. That was the one I needed. It not only confirmed in my heart that I was committing to do exactly what I should, but it took it even farther and revealed to me that if I am going to benefit at all, and if I’m to learn anything at all out of the study I’m committing myself to doing, it’s going to come from God.

I know, it’s a really simple thought, right? But it was a revelation to me when it hit me. Not only do I need to improve in my study life, but in my prayer life as well. I can read the Bible until I’m blue in the face, but if I don’t have God’s help in giving me the wisdom and understanding for what I’m reading, it will benefit me little.

To my Christian friends and readers, I desire your prayers. First, so that I get and keep the determination I need to keep at it. I don’t expect to take a step for God and not get resistance from, at the very least, my old nature. Second, so that it will actually benefit me. I don’t expect to study God’s Word and  get nothing from it. But I want all I can get. It’s one thing I feel like I can be selfish about. The thing is, God is big enough to do the same thing for anybody and everybody else that wants it, so I guess it isn’t really all that selfish.

It’s that time of year again. Thanksgiving. The time where families get together, carve up a nice, big, juicy turkey, cook up a huge feast full of everything from cranberry sauce to dressing to pumpkin pie, and watch football.

The turkey is the centerpiece of this feast. Supposedly this all began when Queen Elizabeth of 16th century England was chowing down on some roast goose during a harvest festival. Word came to her that the Spanish Armada had sunk on its way to attack her beloved country of England. She was obviously pleased at this news. So pleased, in fact, that she ordered a second roast goose to celebrate. So, the goose became the favorite item at the yearly harvest. When the pilgrims came to America, turkey replaced the goose because they were in much more abundance, and easier to find. Now, this is only one of several stories that I have found about why we always have turkey at Thanksgiving.

Not only do we have turkey, but we fulfill our gluttony on other foods like cranberry sauce, dressing, chicken n’ dumplin’s, mac n’ cheese, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, stuffing…the list could go on and on. Most of the time, we have to have at least a little bit of everything so that by the time we’ve tried it all, we’re stuffed so full that we can’t eat any pumpkin pie. So all we’re worth at that point is to lay on the couch and watch football.

Ah, football. Yet another Thanksgiving tradition. What would Thanksgiving day be without the Cowboys or the Lions? I personally don’t care much for either team, but they have both become a part of the Thanksgiving tradition. It just has to be there to make the day complete. After all, football is part of what Thanksgiving is all about!

…or is it?

So, truly, Thanksgiving has been centered around food the entire time. The Pilgrims, when they came to America, barely survived at first. They immediately went through a harsh, devastating winter. By the next autumn, they had lost nearly half of their number. The harvest that year, however, was a plentiful one. So, they decided to celebrate this harvest, along with a group of Indians that helped them survive the harsh winter and to grow food throughout the spring and summer.

Ultimately, without God, survival would have been impossible. The Indians could have easily killed the Pilgrims in their weak state and kept the land as their own. The Pilgrims could have never found any help, and simply wandered around and died through that winter. God put everything in place for them to be able to survive, and ultimately flourish in this new great land.

So again, I’ll agree that food has a lot to do with Thanksgiving, but it is much, much more than that. For, without God, we are but lost and wandering in every aspect of our lives. God provides so much for us, that many times we take it for granted. We have so much to be thankful for, far beyond what we eat, what we wear, or where we live. The simple ability to be able to get up out of bed on my own each morning and walk on my own two feet is a blessing from God. How often is that taken for granted? To keep that in mind keeps things in perspective. I’ll never be able to thank God enough for what He has done for me.

Let’s see this day for what it really is. An opportunity to slow down and reflect on the things God has done for us, and to give Him thanks.

About a month or so ago, a young lady in our youth group at church approached me and asked if I would be interested in speaking at an FCA (Fellowship of Christian Athletes) gathering. I was honored to even be considered for something like that, and I jumped at the opportunity.

Since that time, I began thinking and praying about what God would have me to give that day. I was being led in a certain direction, then 2 of the young ladies that are in FCA and in our youth group told me what I should talk about. (I say that jokingly, but halfway serious also…)

Here’s what the deal was. At a late summer church event (a fun day to end the summer with lots of outdoor water games), I had the privilege to give a devotion to kick it off. I talked about how big God is, and how He meted out Heaven with the span of His hand. (Isaiah 40:12). In all fairness, I stole the thought from another preacher I heard preaching about it a few years ago. But it’s a great thought, and the youth were all amazed at how big God really is. So this is what they told me to speak on. This is also the direction God was guiding my heart.

So yesterday at this FCA gathering, I spoke to two groups at Central High in Wartburg. They have two lunch periods, and they meet during their lunch. I spoke along the same lines, and about how problems we face are like mountains. If God is so big to be able to mete out Heaven with the span of His hand, then the mountain of a problem we’re facing is a small thing to God and He has no trouble taking care of it, or taking care of us as we go through it.

They seemed to listen, and I really hope it was a blessing to them. I know it was to me. This was the first time I’ve done anything quite like this. I enjoyed it greatly, and my hope and prayer is that God somehow touched a life through me yesterday.

On my way to work this morning I saw a church sign with the words, “Truth Hurts”. I’ve actually been thinking along those same lines lately. There are several things over the past few months that have been brought up during preaching I’ve heard, as well as things I’ve been involved with personally, that when the truth has been spoken, it hurts.

I began asking myself, “Why does truth hurt? What makes it so harsh?” Mind you, I’m not questioning the validity or importance of truth at all. Truth is what is needed, rather than untruths or incomplete truths to make someone feel better about themselves or accepted in certain cliques.

The answer to the question of why truth hurts I believe is two-fold. First I’ll quote a verse:

Great peace have they which love thy law: and nothing shall offend them.  -Psalm 119:165.

Back in February during our youth revival, I heard a message preached about the Great White Throne Judgment, and the reality of Hell. It was one of the roughest messages I’ve heard preached on Hell in a long time. It didn’t bother me at all though, for my own life (It did bother me for those that were present who were lost and didn’t respond). Not because I’ve grown cold or calloused to the subject, but because I have peace about my eternal destination because of what Jesus has done for me, and the fact that I’ve accepted Him as my Savior. So my point is that when you line up with the truth that is spoken, it doesn’t hurt. Which brings me to the first part of my answer.

Truth hurts because it exposes where you are wrong. It doesn’t necessarily expose it for all the world to see, but it will expose it to your conscience and your very soul. At the very least, it embarrasses you because you know that you’re not lining up with what is right.

The second part of my answer depends on a person’s willingness to respond to the truth they’ve been given. If they choose to correct where they’ve done wrong, it can hurt. An example can be where a person has done someone wrong, thinking they were right in doing whatever it was. When they were told the truth about the situation, it required them to humble themselves to go to that person and make things right with them. That’s a severe beating on a person’s pride!

The start of a healing process sometimes hurts. I’ll use an analogy here. I got into a little bit of poison ivy a little while back. It wasn’t bad – just a few small spots on both of my arms. I figured they were small enough and insignificant enough that if I left them alone, they’d heal on their own. On my left arm, a couple of those spots became bigger and were beginning to blister. I tried waiting a few more days, but they weren’t getting any better. I eventually had to pop those blisters and clean the wound really well so that it would heal properly. I didn’t look forward to beginning that healing process – popping those blisters didn’t hurt all that much, but cleaning them was a little painful. Rubbing alcohol was the best thing I could get my hands on for the job, and it burns on an open wound! However, it was a good thing to do, because those blisters are gone, and now you can barely tell there was any poison ivy there in the first place.

So there you have my reasons of why I believe truth hurts. It is only my opinion, but I think it’s right. Remember, though, that truth doesn’t have to hurt.

Feel free to leave your opinions on the topic on the comments section for this post. I could go on and on about it all, but I think most other ‘reasons’ could fall under the two I’ve listed here in one way or another. I’d be interested to see what others think about this all, though.

Everybody around the world knows who he was. He was a very popular entertainer and people around the world loved him. He had a lot of accomplishments, and all of the news media are talking about how great of a person he was and how much they will miss him. It would be comical if it wasn’t so serious, but everywhere I look, everyone is saying ‘rest in peace’.

Nowhere in Jackson’s life can I find that he ever came to know Christ. I won’t go so far as to say he lived completely for himself because he gave to charities and such, but even some of that was pretty controversial. What I will say is that he did nothing for the cause of Christ. According to my Bible, and according to his testimony, he is far from Heaven.

Hell is real. It is hot. Everything Jackson did here was temporal. Nothing lasted. Nothing he did will help him. Nothing. People will say that his influence lives on, and his spirit lives on in his music, etc. I don’t deny that. But it still will not help him. It will not help you, either.

Everyone, if all you live for is to satisfy the flesh, whether it be with music or anything else, it is all temporal. It has no lasting eternal benefit. I’m not against having fun, but if you’ve never been saved, you’ll end up with the same fate as this ‘great’ person.

If you are saved, our first priority ought to be to please God. I can’t think of much of anything about this person that pleased God. Especially his music.

I expect harsh comments, and will only censor vulgar or otherwise filthy language. Otherwise you may speak your mind. I reserve the right, however, to cut it off at any time. It’s my blog, my rules.

A few days ago I planted some seeds in potting soil in some containers in the house to prepare for warm weather for my garden. I planted tomato seeds, pepper seeds and broccoli seeds. Nothing has sprouted yet, and I’m impatiently waiting for that first something to come out of the dirt. These tiny plants will require water and sunlight to grow and become strong. Then once they’re moved outside they’ll require even more water, which we hope will mostly come in the form of rain. They’ll still require sunlight, of which they’ll have an abundant supply. One thing that requires hard labor, though, is keeping the weeds out of the garden. If the weeds are allowed to grow at will, they’ll choke out the plants that have been put there and they’ll not bear much fruit.

Beginning in the last week of February, we had a great youth revival at our church that lasted for two weeks. During that time, there was some hard preaching and some encouraging preaching. Each night, however, caused us all to search our hearts and draw a little closer to the Lord.

During those two weeks there were some seeds planted in our hearts. In some hearts those seeds even already began to sprout. The preaching we heard is what planted those seeds, and even provided the nourishment (water, which is a type of the Word of God). We were even exposed to a little bit of Sonlight when the Lord visited with us during the meeting. These were all of the requirements for those seeds to begin to grow in our hearts.

Now the revival meeting is over and we’re out in the ‘garden’ of the world. These tiny little plants still require a lot of care, and always will as they grow. The only difference between these ‘plants’ in our hearts and the ones in a regular garden is twofold:

1: The rain (water, again a type of the Word of God) isn’t going to always come all by itself. We’ll have to manually water those plants by getting in the Bible ourselves and saturating ourselves with it to get that same nourishment.

2: The Sonlight is always readily available, but we have to be sure we’re in a position to receive it, and let it shine on us. We have to always be willing and ready to let the Lord work in our hearts and lives.

The third thing again is that there are ‘weeds’ that we’ll have to deal with. There will always be things in our lives that try to spring up and take away from what our purpose in life is – to bear fruit in God’s service. We have to always be on the lookout for these ‘weeds’. Some of them look like real plants and look like they’ll be ok if we leave them alone and let them grow. Others are more obvious, but it’s tempting to leave them alone because it’s such hard work to get them out of our way.

All of these things are necessary if we want the great revival meeting we’ve just had to do us any lasting good. For all of us, no doubt, God showed us some specific things we needed to do – that is the seed. The preaching we heard continually watered that seed, and God confirmed it in our hearts when He made His presence known in the services.

Now it’s up to us to continue to seek God and keep giving those plants nourishment as they grow. If we ignore them, they’ll die and it will have all been in vain.

These days, anything can be a ‘god’ (Little g). A boat, a game, a gadget – whatever it may be that you find yourself unable to live without, whatever it is that takes up the majority of your time, or whatever it is that takes time away from the one true God.

I personally have several things that if I were to allow them, they could easily take first place in my life – the place God wants to be.  This is not to say that I have completely conquered those things that would become gods to me.  Far from it, in fact.

I find myself more and more having to be careful what I allow my mind to dwell on, or being careful about what I spend my time doing.  For example, I’m trying to get up earlier in the morning so that I can have more time to start my day off right in prayer and in reading the Bible.  But sleep is such a great feeling and I count sleep as a precious thing.  But that’s the problem with all of this – which is more precious to me?

This month has been a great month at our church – it is youth month, and the theme is “The Lord Jesus Christ, Our Souls’ Desire”.  You see, having the Lord first in our lives can go such a long way in having the rest of our lives line up with what they ought to be, according to God’s Word.  Having Him first in our lives means our priorities are more in line with what He wants for our lives.  Sports, activities and ‘things’ all have their place, but they must be after God.  If God doesn’t have first place in our lives, we will begin to lose sight of Him and begin to stray.  Other things will begin to take first place in our lives more and more, and God will soon be way down on the list.  We will become miserable.  We might have fun and be happy, but it’s only superficial.  Deep down, our joy will be gone.  That joy that only God can give will be nowhere to be found – until we get God back into first place in our lives.

One thing that has been stressed all month it seems is that we have to individually get alone with God in prayer, reading and meditation.  It’s easy to serve God while we’re at church, but a whole other thing to serve Him and seek Him when nobody else is around.  It is necessary, however, for us to be able to have a Spiritually fulfilling life.

It’s been said a few times this month that we can have all of God that we want.  I’ve heard it all my life, but lately it is becoming more real to me.  How much do I really want God?  Am I ok with just a little ‘dab’, or do I really want all of God that I can have?

It all goes back to who (or what) is in first place in my life.  If He isn’t in first place in my life, all the time, I’m ultimately going to go to church and put on a front.  I’ll be a different person outside of church – not necessarily a sinful person, but anyone would be able to look at me and tell that God wasn’t in first place.  On the other hand, if God is in first place in my life, all the time, first of all I’ll be the same everywhere you see me.  Second, you’ll be able to see something different in me.

I want that closer walk with God.  I want to do what it takes.  I want to spend time alone with God.  I want to meditate on His Word more.  What is my motivation, you ask?  I want Him to be my soul’s desire.  I want Him to be at the center of my life.