Have you ever wondered what your thought pattern is going to be when you come down to the end of your life? Will you be like Paul and say “For I am ready to be poured out like a drink offering, and the time has come for my departure. I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race. I have kept the faith.” (II Timothy 4:6-7) Do you long to hear the words, “Well done good and faithful servant?” I always talk tuff and say that I’m ready to go, but when it comes down to it we’ll see where my faith lies!
But remember the old song, “This World is Not My Home?” it’s true that we are just foreigners here and there is a promised land waiting for us in Heaven! That’s real folks! Life, at least to me, is great down here on this earth, but can you imagine what Heaven is going to be like? And we have a promise that we will be there if we know Jesus as our personal Savior! Paul writes in I Corinthians 15:19, “If only for this life we have hope in Christ, we are to be pitied more than all men.”
So then, we have Faith to trust Jesus as our Savior, we have Hope that we are going to make Heaven our home, and then we have that agape Love that allows us to treat our neighbor as we would treat ourselves. And the best part of all of that is the fact that it all comes through the grace of God! We get God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense! We don’t have to work for it folks! We just get it because our Heavenly Father loves us so much!
Please let me know if you need anything. Naomi and I love you all.
-Pastor Steve
Hubbell Family Benefit
Shadows in the light
Does anybody remember this song?
When I look into Your holiness, When I gaze into Your loveliness
When all things that surround become shadows In the light of You;
When I’ve found the joy of reaching Your heart, When my will becomes enthralled in Your love When all things that surround become shadows In the light of You,
I worship You, I worship You, The reason I live is to worship You
I worship You, I worship You, The reason I live is to worship You
I’m not sure who wrote it or what year it was that Naomi and I first heard it but I do remember it really touching my heart. Especially the words, “When all things that surround become shadows in the light of You, I worship You…”So what that is saying is that everything that we do, everything we say, everything that we face every day is a shadow compared to Him! He burns brighter, He shines brighter in my life and He makes all the bad things good! And He does this not by changing our circumstances, but by changing us! He is in the life changing business and I for one am thankful for that!
Alan Redpath once wrote, “The conversion of a soul is the miracle of a moment; the manufacture of saint is the task of a lifetime.” Philippians 1:6 “being confident of this, that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Jesus Christ.” Amen.
God Bless Your Day! Keep me in your daily prayers, please! Love All Y’All!!
~Pastor Steve~
Pure heart
Psalms 51 was the Psalm that David wrote after Nathan the prophet had come to him and confronted him about his adultery with Bathsheba and had Uriah killed in battle. What a great Psalm and what a merciful God we have! I want to challenge you to not just read but study the whole chapter and then apply it to your life.
The verse that really sticks out to me as I study this chapter is verse 10; “Create in me a pure heart, oh God, and renew a right spirit within me.” Did you see that? He doesn’t say anything about how the Devil made me do it. He doesn’t blame his circumstances. It’s not the environment he was raised in. He didn’t ask God to change anyone else, he asked God to change him!
You ever tried to make someone change? It doesn’t work t0o well does it? I’ve been trying to get Naomi to squeeze the toothpaste tube from the bottom and turn off lights for over 33 years now and it hasn’t happened yet! I’ve even shown her the benefits of lower electricity bills and read to her on the toothpaste tube where it says “For best results, start at the bottom and work up,” but she doesn’t care! So I have to give in and realize the only one I can change is me! Not my co-worker, not the other drivers on the road and for sure not my wife! Just me. Only me. And only through the help of my Lord Jesus Christ can “I can do all things.”
We don’t have to let others rob us of our joy. We don’t have to get frustrated with others when they irritate us. We are the only ones that can ruin our day. Our day won’t be ruined unless we allow it to be no matter what others do to us.
But we can’t do it in our own strength! We need to be empowered by the Holy Spirit of God and be plugged into Him. That’s the only way to overcome our flesh. That’s the only way to have a new heart created in us.
Read Psalms 51. It’s a great read!
God Bless Your Day, and please pray for me and I’ll pray for you!
~ Pastor Steve~
Make Him first in your life
Luke 12:35-40 Be dressed ready for service and keep your lamps burning, like servants waiting for their master to return from a wedding banquet, so that when he comes and knocks they can immediately open the door for him. It will be good for those servants whose Master finds them watching when he comes. Truly I tell you, He will dress himself to serve, will make them recline at the table and will come and wait on them. It will be good for those servants whose Master finds them ready, even if He comes in the middle of the night or towards daybreak. But understand this: if the owner of the house had known at what hour the thief was coming, he would not have let his house be broken into. You also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect Him.’
I sure do love this quote by C. H. Spurgeon: “It is a very blessed thing to be on the watch for Christ, it is a blessing to us now. How it detaches you from the world! You can be poor without murmuring; you can be rich without worldliness. . . . Untold blessings are wrapped up in the glorious hope.”
Are you on watch for the return of our Lord Jesus? Is your life shining before men that they can see your good works and glorify you Father in Heaven? Will you recognize His voice when He calls? Make Him first in your life and you will be ready!
You pray for me and I’ll pray for you. Let us know how we can serve you.
~Pastor Steve~