Carpenter?

People tell us all kinds of things. We can even believe them to be true, but does our belief MAKE them true? No. The truth stands on its own. Our challenge is to find out what that truth is.

To do that we need to do our homework. We need to examine things to make sure we are being told the truth. We shouldn't just accept things because they sound good or because someone you thought you could trust told you. We should look them up for ourselves! Be a good Berean!

"10 As soon as it was night, the believers sent Paul and Silas away to Berea. On arriving there, they went to the Jewish synagogue. 11 Now the Berean Jews were of more noble character than those in Thessalonica, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true. 12 As a result, many of them believed, as did also a number of prominent Greek women and many Greek men." - Acts 17:10-12

I was having a conversation with friend the other day and I brought up the Mark 6 Bible verse that says "Isn't this (Jesus), the carpenter's son? Isn't this Mary's son?" My friend said, "You know, that's really translated "Builder" not "Carpenter".

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I could say nothing. I don't know all the Greek words. Maybe my friend was right. So I thought I'd do a little research.

It just so happened that the Sunday before our pastor had told us about a Bible app he uses. And it's free!! And it had all the Greek, Aramaic, and Hebrew text too. So I checked it out. Here's a screen shot of the key Greek word (tekton) and its Greek meaning. Carpenter.

You might say you don't believe in God. Our belief has nothing to do with whether or not God actually exists. We can believe anything we want. But if our beliefs are founded in an untruth, they are nothing more than a lie.

Examine everything that comes into your eyes, ears and mouth to see whether or not it is true. Be a good Berean.

What I Believe - Skillet

Spiritual Inertia

Does you schedule fill up faster than a baby's diaper on a busy day? Are you tired of all the things on your to-do list wearing out their welcome? Here's something you can do to help alleviate your problems.

Throw out your list!

Of course, we can't really do that most days. Sometimes we have a ton of stuff that just HAS to be done. But we can prioritize that list. We can decide which items really need to be done first. And then get them done!!

Most mornings I watch the news as I am eating breakfast. When I finish eating there is a tendency to keep watching the television, even though I have many things on my to-do list. My tendency is to do nothing while my Bible is on the table next to my comfy living room chair.

A body at rest tends to stay at rest. That is the definition of the word "inertia". So where do we get inertia from? It doesn't come in a bottle. It's not sold in stores. The good news is, it DOES sit on shelves in most of our houses. The problem is we're not using it enough. It's the Bible!

I am reading through Proverbs right now. There are many wise sayings concerning my topic for today. So why aren't I reading more? Why aren't I applying what I have just read? Inertia. Spiritual Inertia.

Let me re-write the Law of Inertia for you, with a spiritual twist.

An earthly body tends to stay at rest while a heavenly body tends to stay in motion, serving the Lord.

Turn off the television and pick up the Bible, get out and serve! I'm talking to myself here. Let's get going!

What motivates YOU when it comes to serving God? The fear of God does it for me!

"4 A sluggard’s appetite is never filled, but the desires of the diligent are fully satisfied." - Proverbs 13:4

Sedentary - AAOS Commercial

Do Something

It's easy to sit in our living rooms and vocalize our opinions about what we see on the news. It's another thing entirely to get up off our butts and actually do something about it.

The perfect example of this is when my wife and I go walking together. I'll see some trash on the side of the road and make some comment about the person who threw it there.

My wife, on the other hand, walks over and picks it up. She wants our neighborhood to look nice. After a while her hands get pretty full so I step in and offer to help. That's a perfect example of how one person's efforts can lead to others stepping up and helping.

I watch my Facebook news feed a lot. Yes, I'm 66 years old. I watch it for a reason though. So I can do something. As a former youth leader . . . No, once a youth leader, always a youth leader. The point is, I care about our youth and our struggling young adults.

Periodically one will call or text seeking advice. That's wonderful. But what I am looking for on Facebook are the ones whose cry is silent. The kid who has been abused, neglected and hurt. I am looking for the kid in the picture. Why? So I can do something.

Maybe I have been sensitized by the suicide deaths of two youth group kids. It doesn't matter. I want to do something and this is it.

"But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves." - James 1:22

When we find ourselves complaining about something, here's something to consider. What if God created YOU to fix the very thing you were complaining about?

You don't like the trash on the side of the road? Pick it up! You don't like the number of suicides occurring in the world? Do something about it! Make yourself available. Love the unlovable. Reach a hand out to the wounded and hurting.

God didn't create us to go to work and earn our precious money and to comment on other people's lives. God created us to love and to worship Him. And what better way to worship God than by keeping His commandments - the highest of which is to love one another.

So, what are you going to do today?

Do Something - Matthew West

Love Is

I believe I have stumbled upon the solution to society's problems, It does cost a little bit but at the same time it costs nothing. It seems to be in short supply these days yet an unlimited supply has been made available to us. What is the answer?

"4 Take delight in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart." - Psalm 37:4

The biggest problem we face as a society is the "innermost desire" of our hearts. We are a sin-filled, selfish lot, we humans. Every news story we see on television has some kind of sin attached to it. Murder is a sin, hatred is a sin, sexual immorality is a sin, stealing is a sin, drunkenness is a sin. There's just a whole lot of sin out there. All these things and more have one thing in common. An inner, selfish desire.

Of course, the answer to my opening question, and all of the desires mentioned in my last paragraph, is Jesus. And Jesus, being fully God and fully man, contains many answers in the form of His character. He is just, compassionate, loving, strong, brave, wise, forgiving, encouraging, and He is willing to teach us ALL these things. If we would only listen.

WE are to be like Jesus in this dying world. WE are to be loving and compassionate. WE are to be ALL those things that Jesus is. The world is in desperate need of what WE, and HE, have to offer.

How can we show love to someone today? How can we be compassionate towards someone who is hurting? I think that if we behave more like Jesus and less like ourselves we can go a long way towards providing what the world needs. And what is that mysterious quantity that is in such short supply these days? What is the answer?

Love is.

God Only Knows - For King and Country

Switching Tracks

As we go through life there are times we must make life-changing decisions about what path we are on. Perhaps it's a job, a church or a relationship. All we know for sure is we need to get on a different track.

So, how do we know if it's the right move? Is it our selfish selves that are driving the change? Or is it God Himself through the Holy Spirit?

When I get to moments like that in my life I invariably ask myself this question. "Am I doing the right thing?" And that's my biggest problem. I am asking myself  that question and not God.

Prayer can be frustrating sometimes. We ask something of God and then we don't get any clear answers about what we should do. There is a reason for that. I think it's because God wants US to make that decision. He wants us to ask ourselves, "What does God want me to do?" and then do it!

If we think every decision through and make our decisions based on our knowledge of God, we end up making the right decision every time.

I changed jobs once. I had wrestled with the decision for months. When I finally made the move to switch, on my way home I saw a bald eagle fly across the road in front of me. It actually turned its head and looked at me. I'm not saying God directed that eagle to do that but it was very reassuring to me. Kind of a sign.

I made one of those big decisions last week. Should I have done what I did? There was that question again. Doubt enters in and we wonder. Shortly after making that decision I saw an old friend in town. They wondered if I would be interested in using one of my God-given gifts to help him out. Of course! Again, very reassuring to me.

Have you ever gotten confirmation that the big decision YOU made was the right one? It seems to happen more than just occasionally. But we shouldn't need confirmation from God. We should know in our hearts which direction is right. We should know what the right track is we need to be on. Our confirmation is in God's Word!

"105Your word is a lamp for my feet, a light on my path." - Psalm 119:105

Step into a new day
We can rise up from the dust and walk away
We can dance upon our heartache, yeah
So light a match, leave the past, burn the ships
And don't you look back

Burn The Ships - For King and Country

Let It Rain

Last time I wrote I talked about getting naked before God. Unloading all of our dirty laundry into God's laundry basket. But even after we've removed all of our filthy clothes we're still dirty. We're just naked and dirty. We still need to take a shower! Let it rain!

Back in the Old Testament days the priests had to purify themselves before they could enter into the presence of The Lord. They had to take a bath and put on clean garments. They had to keep cleansing themselves time after time to make sure they were clean and not defiled.

In the New Testament however there is no need for a purified priest to cleanse himself for us. Jesus is our high priest. He's 100% clean already! But we do need to come before God through Jesus. We need to be IN Him. Jesus takes away our sins. Our dirtiness. Jesus makes us clean and pure.

When we place our faith in Jesus we are baptized, not with water, but with God's Holy Spirit. We become changed! It's an amazing thing. When we become clean in that way it's like God turned on the shower for us. All we have to do is step in and let it rain!

"1While Apollos was at Corinth, Paul took the road through the interior and arrived at Ephesus. There he found some disciples 2and asked them, "Did you receive the Holy Spirit when you believed?" They answered, "No, we have not even heard that there is a Holy Spirit." 3So Paul asked, "Then what baptism did you receive?" "John's baptism," they replied. 4Paul said, "John's baptism was a baptism of repentance. He told the people to believe in the one coming after him, that is, in Jesus." 5On hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the LORD Jesus." - Acts 19:1-5

Let It Rain - Michael W. Smith

Let's Get Naked!

Today's story is going to be a little different. The title might lead you to believe I am writing about something dirty. Well, actually, I am. But I am actually writing about the act of getting "naked" before God.

We were actually designed by God to be naked you know.

25Adam and his wife were both naked, and they felt no shame." - Genesis 2:25

See? It's biblical! But when sin entered the world we became ashamed of our bodies and began to cover them up.

"6When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves." - Genesis 3:6-7

Ever since then, being naked has been construed as being bad or frowned upon. We have laws against public nudity. Nudity is a crime! Yet that is actually what God designed us to be  - naked before Him. Let me explain.

Have you ever gone for a jog or mowed the lawn on a hot, humid day? Maybe when the dewpoint is over 60 and really humid? The first thing we want to do after we're finished is take a shower! But first we have to take our sweaty clothes off. That's often hard to do. Our clothes, which were designed to stay on us, and really hard to get off when they're all dirty and sweaty.

When we come before God in prayer, that is the time we should be "getting naked." We must confess all of our dirtiness, the sin we have committed, during our prayers. We must ask Jesus to remove them from us. He has promised to do that for us, if we only would ask.

Asking God to remove our sins can be difficult. We first have to realize that we have them. Then we must desire to get rid of them, but that can be tough. That's why we need Jesus.

In order for us to be clean and pure in God's eyes, naked and not ashamed, we must be washed by Jesus. We do that by surrendering to Him. But more on that next time. Until then I encourage you to bare yourself, your heart and your soul, before God, seek His forgiveness, and do so in the name of His Son, Jesus. It's an amazing feeling to be clean.

Freely Freely - Maranatha

Follow Me

I am getting back into disc golf after a multi-year layoff due to injuries sustained in a car accident. It didn't take me too long to figure out that I am VERY rusty. I still know WHAT to do. I just have trouble doing it. I need practice and perhaps some instruction.

So, I took to YouTube for some of tips. I witnessed the results the pros were getting with their putting styles. Impressive. So I have decided to begin emulating them in hopes of lowering my golf score.

The Bible teaches us to do the same thing in our faith. Paul encouraged the church in Corinth to copy him and what he was doing.

"Follow my example, as I follow the example of Christ." - 1 Corinthians 11:1

When Jesus was gathering His apostles He spoke two words to them. "Follow me." That's it. And they followed. I'm sure there was a little work being done by the Holy Spirit there. Why else would they just drop everything and follow unless they somehow knew that this "stranger" was worth following.

How do we know our pastors and teachers are worth following? Do they just "feel" right? Or do we study the results of their teaching to see if it lines up with God's Word? Most people tend to examine a bunch of things when selecting a new church but few examine the teaching. Most check out the building, the music, friends who might be going there. etc. And that's sad.

Following someone's example can be good or bad - it all depends upon the teacher - the one who is being followed.

In the case of my putting, I first recognized that I was lacking in that area. Then I found an example of someone who was good at putting and chose to follow him. Our example for how we should be living our lives is found in Jesus. He doesn't post YouTube videos but we CAN read the Bible.

Following someone's example will only get us to the same level as they are at. Why not follow the best? In disc golf I follow the best in an effort to improve my game. In my faith and in life I follow Jesus. He IS the best so I follow. We all should strive to be more like Jesus in every way. Today is a good day to start.

The Truth About Following Jesus - Billy Graham
Ricky Wysocki - The Best Putter In Disc Golf

The Best of Times

We were sitting around the dining room table at the farm this past weekend when my wife asked this question of us. "What was your favorite moment from this past (family reunion) weekend?"

"Interesting question," I thought to myself. There were so many moments from which to chose for my answer to that question. Playing disc golf with the boys, conversations with relatives, car bingo. But the best of times this past weekend for me was the time I spent with my niece.

There were two moments really. The first came when the entire family was sitting around the dining room table (we spend a lot of time there. LOL!) at breakfast on Saturday. We were talking and my niece was telling us how she was going to be losing her job. Certainly the worst of times for her.

She had worked for her employer for 12 years and loved everyone and loved working there but the office was closing and she would have to be looking for a new job. Naturally she was nervous and apprehensive about the coming changes.

Eventually everyone got up and left the table to other things and I was left there with my niece. Just the two of us. So we talked and I dug a little deeper into how she was feeling. It's a tough thing when we big changes come into our otherwise comfortable lives. That was a good conversation.

The following day we were getting ready to go to a nearby lake. I went upstairs to get my shoes and notice my niece in the kid's room, cleaning up. I started back down the stairs but then stopped after a few steps and came back up and asked, "Can I pray for you?"

"Sure."

Praying for someone is always the best of times, even during the worst of times. Why? Because we can't get someone a new job, we can't change things when someone dies or is very sick. But God can! I loved praying with and for my niece. Not because I can do anything, but because I know that God can!

"Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete." - John 16:24

When any of us go though the worst of times why not reach out to God? He has the power to change weakness into strength and sorrow into joy. Taking someone you love to God in prayer certainly qualifies as "the best of times" in my book. Seek God first in times of trouble. Minimize the times of sorrow and weakness. Turn the worst of times into the best.

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times." - Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

What The Lord Has Done In Me - Hillsong

The Next Nexus

There is a crossing of paths in life where the good meets the bad, the happy meets the sad. But wherever you are and whatever you do, whatever happens is a nexus between you and God.

I was reminded of this fact as my wife and I drove across the upper peninsula of Michigan yesterday, journeying to a family reunion.

Back home a young friend of mine was in labor, delivering a beautiful baby girl, while down the hall at the same hospital a father was informed that HIS baby in the NICU had died. Happy and sad at the same time, in the same place.

My wife and I just happened to meet up with our daughter and her husband part way through our trip. We had lunch together. It was a happy time. Yet I was reminded of similar trips with MY parents. They are both gone from us. They will not be at the family reunion. A sad time.

Then, sitting at the breakfast table this morning, our niece told us abut an upcoming unplanned job transition. She would be leaving a job she loved and her job family, which she also loved. Truly a sad and uncertain time in her life. What would the future bring? Only God knows.

The nexus between the happy and the sad, known and unknown, is perfectly laid out in the story of Jesus Christ. The happy side is that God cared enough for mankind that He sent his Son to us, to live and then to die - a nexus for sure. But then there was a "second nexus" as Jesus rose from the dead and ascended into heaven. A nexus between sad and happy.

No matter what you are going through in life there will be good and bad, happy and sad. But with Christ, there will always be that second nexus. And for that we give God thanks and praise.

I'm not sure what you are going through.

Mid-Faith Corrections

Watching an eagle landing is an amazing thing to see. One bird managing all those feathers and wind conditions requires a lot of coordination. Yet an eagle manages it all without a thought.

When we launched a rocket to the moon back in the late 60's the astronauts also had to make several mid-flight corrections to keep themselves on target. The same goes for us in our walk with Jesus.

We can go along fine for a while, thinking everything is okay, but then something happens and we suddenly find ourselves off course. We find we are getting farther and farther off the path that Jesus had us walking on. What do we do? It's time for a change. Time for a mid-flight correction. of our own.

Have you ever found yourself off-track in your faith. Maybe you were sitting in church one day and heard the pastor say something that made you do, "What!?" Have you ever made a mid-faith correction? And how do you know you are right in doing so while everyone else is just sitting there doing nothing?

The answer is simple. Reading The Bible is our constant. It is the "runway" when our spiritual plane is being tossed about by the wind. Prayer too is an essential tool that keeps us going in the direction God wants us to. Seeking the direction of God's Holy Spirit is crucial to our walk with Jesus.

"5Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; 6in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight." - Proverbs 3:5-6

Read The Word, pray, and follow in obedience. You will soon find out you are walking right by Jesus once again.

Slow Motion Eagle Landing
Cross-Winds Landings During A Storm

Inventors of Evil

Answers are hard to come by when we try to understand why there is so much violence in our world. "Why?" has got to be the most asked question ever. Why? There IS an answer.

I heard a prominent pastor once say, "When the pews get a little too full I like to pull out one of my 'Wrath of God' sermons." First off, can a church ever be "too full"? But secondly, what is a "Wrath of God" sermon. Open your Bibles to Romans 1 and hold on to your butts.

"18 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of people, who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.

21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. 22 Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools 23 and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like a mortal human being and birds and animals and reptiles.

24 Therefore God gave them over in the sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. 25 They exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator—who is forever praised. Amen.

26 Because of this, God gave them over to shameful lusts. Even their women exchanged natural sexual relations for unnatural ones. 27 In the same way the men also abandoned natural relations with women and were inflamed with lust for one another. Men committed shameful acts with other men, and received in themselves the due penalty for their error.

28 Furthermore, just as they did not think it worthwhile to retain the knowledge of God, so God gave them over to a depraved mind, so that they do what ought not to be done. 29 They have become filled with every kind of wickedness, evil, greed and depravity. They are full of envy, murder, strife, deceit and malice. They are gossips, 30 slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; 31 they have no understanding, no fidelity, no love, no mercy. 32 Although they know God’s righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them." - Romans 1:18-32

There is a lot of present-day society represented in this passage of scripture from The Book of Romans. In light of the recent shootings in Texas and Ohio we seem to definitely be a world filling with "inventors of evil." And Paul was preaching to The Church in Rome itself 2000 years ago!

Imagine what the world will look like when Jesus returns and raptures His church out of here. It's not going to be pretty for those who have been left behind. Our future is a personal choice made by each one of us. The choice we make will have eternal consequences. The only question that remains is, "Are we ready?"

Left Behind Trailer

The Stand

How is the battle going today my friend? Are you doing well? Are you standing strong? Or are you weak and weary, worn down by all of the drama and pain in your life? Don't give up. Stand!

We've all had days where it seems like nothing is going right. What do you do when that happens. When it seems like there is no hope and all seems lost? What do you do?

I have seen a lot of people post their struggles on Facebook. What happens then? Usually, friends come to the rescue, posting encouraging things. Stay strong, don't give up, you're amazing. That quickly subsides however and the person is left there. No better. Just with another scar.

Do you have that one friend? The one who always comes to your rescue? I hope so. That's always nice. But they can't stay with you forever. At some point they go back home and then there you are again. Alone.

Have you considered Jesus? The one who promised you that He would NEVER leave you? Have you considered the advise in His Word, The Bible? What does He tell us to do when we are faced with the attacks of The Devil? Does He tell us to run away from our problems? No! He tells us to RESIST the devil and he will flee us. He also tells us to STAND. and to "be strong in The Lord". And just how do we do that? The answer is in The Bible - Ephesians 6 to be precise.

"10Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power. 11Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes. 12For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. 13Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. 14Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, 15and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. 16In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. 17Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God." - Ephesians 6:10-17

Do you remember the battle of Helmsdeep from The Lord of The Rings - The Two Towers? What did they do? They rode out to meet their enemy. Not alone. They could not defeat their foe without the help of a savior - Gandalf. He rode on a white horse. He was dressed in white and he came with the breaking light of day.

Yeah. Jesus is like that. He will do the same for you!

The Battle of Helmsdeep
The Words I Would Say - Sidewalk Prophets

Contact Juggling

Are you good at juggling? I'm not. I taught myself how to juggle in college with some rolled up socks. Although I can juggle (marginally) it doesn't mean I'm any good at it. These days people juggle everyday. We don't juggle balls, We juggle events in our lives.

People develop all kinds of stress in their lives, simply by trying to "keep all of the balls in the air," Is that you? How do you do it? Are you even able to? It takes a lot of effort to keep our busy lives going. How can we ever get the rest we need?

Are you familiar with the art of contact juggling? The balls never leave a persons hands but it often appears like they do. What's interesting is the juggler is always in contact with the objects he or she is juggling. There is a far smaller chance of dropping one of the juggled objects than in conventional juggling.

What if we tried juggling all of the events in our lives lie that? And what if we just let God do the juggling for us. I think the end result would be a lot less stressful and a lot more successful.

"7 Cast all your anxiety on him because he cares for you." - 1 Peter 5:7

"7 Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." - James 4:7

"6 Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." - Philippians 4:6

Contact Juggling