U.S.A Reclaims Gold in Basketball

This morning I got home from church just in time to see the fourth quarter of the gold medal game between U.S. men and Spain. It wasn't a blowout like the last time they met, it was close up until the last couple minutes. The U.S. team was loaded with NBA stars. Almost every big name from the NBA was on this team, but I want to point out one in particular. One that isn't a house hold name to most, at least not in this area. Michael Redd. Why him out of all the stars on this team? Well let me share a quote from Michael Redd.

• “Since I’ve had the Lord Jesus Christ in my life, miraculous things have happened to me. I just thank God every day for Him blessing me and showing me favor when I’m not worthy of any of that. I keep Him first and I’m diligent in keeping Him first.”

I can not find the quote in print, but I heard it on the radio. After one of the teams victories Michael Redd gave all the credit to God. It is quite refreshing to hear this from some one on a team that could easily get swept up in arrogance. All the talent surrounding him, but he still recognizes that it is all only possible by the grace of God.

So mission accomplished. God was glorified, even though the media tries to hide it, and the gold is coming back to the U.S.A. So I say congratulations to Michael Redd, and keep giving the glory where it belongs even when it doesn't get the wide spread attention that it should. And boo's to the media for not putting this quote out there!

http://news.sport.org/2008/08/16/michael-redd-usa-mens-basketball/

• 1 Corinthians 10:31 Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.

America's Biggest Problem

If you watch any TV or listen to any radio you are bound to hear a lot of talk about problems in America. So many problems are discussed. Crime of all sorts, political issues, abortion, all sorts of things are out there. Then there is usually some "expert" that comes on to give a solution. We need to reach out, or we need to fund programs to help. Well I am offering up another solution. The one that is always overlooked, or at the very least not mentioned. Addressing all these problems is like a broken arm and just taking aspirin for it. It might dull the pain, but it is not going to fix your arm. The biggest problem we are faced with is the fact that over many years people have waged a war to remove God from any and everything in the public eye. We are now seeing the results of this plastered across the news every day. There is no moral standard with out God. People truly do not know how much they are violating God's law. Man's standard of conduct is far inferior to the perfect standard that is the very nature of God, lived out in the flesh by Jesus Christ. The solution should be quite simple, the great commission. Christians must spread the word. We simply must hold up the mirror that is the Ten Commandments to show people their sinful ways. We must also stand up to defend public displays of our Lord and His Laws. God's chosen land, Israel, went through things like this too. The people were distracted from God and slowly fell into heresy and God allowed them to be overrun by other nations. I'm not going to quote a verse to back that up, it's pretty much the entire book of Judges.
On a related side note. I heard a shocking fact on the radio this week. Since Roe vs. Wade, abortions are closing in on 50 million, this is 38 times more deaths than all America's wars, revolutionary through Iraq. Yet people still have the nerve to protest the war and defend abortion. Shocking.

• Mark 16:15-16 15 And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. 16 He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned.
• Acts 5:4-11 4 While it remained, was it not your own? And after it was sold, was it not in your own control? Why have you conceived this thing in your heart? You have not lied to men but to God.”5 Then Ananias, hearing these words, fell down and breathed his last. So great fear came upon all those who heard these things. 6 And the young men arose and wrapped him up, carried him out, and buried him.7 Now it was about three hours later when his wife came in, not knowing what had happened. 8 And Peter answered her, “Tell me whether you sold the land for so much?” She said, “Yes, for so much.” 9 Then Peter said to her, “How is it that you have agreed together to test the Spirit of the Lord? Look, the feet of those who have buried your husband are at the door, and they will carry you out.” 10 Then immediately she fell down at his feet and breathed her last. And the young men came in and found her dead, and carrying her out, buried her by her husband. 11 So great fear came upon all the church and upon all who heard these things.

They were struck down for one lie. Sin is exceedingly sinful, no matter how man views it. The fault in our thinking is we view sin as against man, what makes it so terrible is that we actually sin against the perfectly Holy Lord, our God.

• Acts 28:26-27 26 saying, ‘ Go to this people and say: “ Hearing you will hear, and shall not understand; And seeing you will see, and not perceive; 27 For the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, And their eyes they have closed, Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, So that I should heal them.”’

Disturbing Events in Church

I know that sounds completely opposite of what you would expect, but that is exactly what I encountered today. Today our sermon revolved around the doom of false prophets. Which meant our pastor spent most of the time preaching on sin and the reality of Hell, but this is not what was disturbing to me.I actually enjoy that sort of preaching, we must not lose sight of God's wrath, as it is what makes His grace necessary. At our church they hand our a copy of sermon notes with blanks to fill in as you follow along. Well today when the pastor gave the last line of the application and the last blank was filled in I was struck by an almost deafening sounds. The sound of many people, sounded like most, putting away their papers and their Bibles. The sound of shuffling papers, the zippers on Bible covers and the shuffling of people almost drowned out the pastor who was still preaching. This was very disturbing to me. I don't think these are people any worse than the rest of us, but this packing up gives the impression you can not get out of the church fast enough. To me it seems if this is your main concern perhaps you shouldn't have come to church at all. I think the problem might be that people have lost focus. I believe they may have fallen into the trap of after the service asking what did I gain from that? Was that pleasing to Me? When we should be asking was that pleasing to God? Did we honor God the best we could today? I feel this maybe an off shoot of the present American mindset, it's all about me. When we go to church on Sunday morning, we are reporting for a worship service. Not to worship our selves, or the pastor, but we are there to worship and praise our Creator, our Lord, our Saviour, our God. The God of the universe. The one who created all we know, and that we have yet to discover, by simply speaking it into existence. God is everywhere. He sees you packing up early, and worse still He knows your thoughts. There is no excuses, He knows your very intentions before you even thought of them. What could be so important in your life that you are in such a rush to leave the church? Have you forgotten the grace and mercy that was shown to you? What if God had turned His back on you 5 minutes before your reconciliation?Did Jesus Christ not tire of hanging on the cross? Of bearing your sins? What is He had left 5 minutes before "It is finished."? Am I perfect, not by a long shot! But when I am in church I am there to worship God, to praise Him for the mercy and grace shown to me when I was but a sinner, an enemy of God. I may get fidgety for sitting still for so long, but I am sitting, Bible open, attentive until the pastor is finished. If he runs long, great! I welcome the chance to learn from those who have studied The Bible far more than I have. Plus let us not forget what our pastors have risked for us, taking up the calling they have put themselves up to be held to a higher standard at Judgement. So next Sunday let's make sure our focus is in the right place, on God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

• 2 Timothy 4:2-4 2 Preach the word! Be ready in season and out of season. Convince, rebuke, exhort, with all longsuffering and teaching. 3 For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; 4 and they will turn their ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables.

Videos I watch regularly

Since I haven't had many posts lately I thought I would double up and just include a couple of videos I watch on a regular basis. Both for their own reasons. Hope they speak to you all the same way the convict me. Enjoy!

1. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_zpokAFfos
2. http://www.godtube.com/view_video.php?viewkey=ee73e63418003b47d7d5

In the word of the Old Testament prophet Isaiah:

• Isaiah 53:4-6 4 Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted. 5 But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed. 6 All we like sheep have gone astray; We have turned, every one, to his own way; And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.
• John 19:30 So when Jesus had received the sour wine, He said, “It is finished!” And bowing His head, He gave up His spirit.

Once for All!

The Cross Still Stands!

Wow! All I can say is Wow! I just watched a video of John Piper called You Need the Gospel Every Day. You can see it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pwn2GLm5MsY
I won't go through all he said, but I'll just tell what impressed me in the video.
In my title here I said the cross still stands, but I don't mean literally. Well in a way it is literal, but not the wood that held our Saviour. The cross is in the past, one time for all, the just for the un just. But the cross still stands. Where is it? It stands in each and every saved soul. We are saved by the sacrifice made upon that cross, the Perfect Spotless Lamb of God endured the Wrath of God the Father for all of us. We have no hope for salvation apart from that cross. And once we are saved, we never out grow our need of the Gospel. So as we go out everyday focusing on The Gospel, and live the Christian life, that old cross stands in us. One event in the past and if we could see it there would be a massive river flowing forward through time from that event. Some one passed it to you, and you became part of the river, and we will pass it on to draw more into the river. Why does this one event stand over all others? Because in it is true power, pure love, and a righteous wrath. The wrath of God is very real, and it is being carried out every day. A lot of non believers say there is no wrath cause God is love. The flaw in that logic is that God is also just. The love , wrath, justice, and righteousness of God were all perfectly exhibited on Calvary's cross. God's wrath is very real, otherwise there would be no reason for the cross. So like John Piper says, preach the Gospel to yourself everyday!

• Romans2:4-11 4 Or do you despise the riches of His goodness, forbearance, and longsuffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance? 5 But in accordance with your hardness and your impenitent heart you are treasuring up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, 6 who “will render to each one according to his deeds”: 7 eternal life to those who by patient continuance in doing good seek for glory, honor, and immortality; 8 but to those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness—indignation and wrath, 9 tribulation and anguish, on every soul of man who does evil, of the Jew first and also of the Greek; 10 but glory, honor, and peace to everyone who works what is good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 11 For there is no partiality with God.

Are you in the 4%?

I heard a sermon from Greg Laurie where he said he read a study that said only 4 percent of adults can define the great commission, recite John 3:16, and accurately describe The Gospel. I guess these are things I just took for granted. I had no idea, I had assumed everyone that called themselves a Christian would know these things. These numbers were just flat out shocking to me.
Oddly enough, my reaction was to blame my self. No I am not so vain to think it is all my fault, but I am not guiltless. I am not out there making a point to tell some one each and every day. Truthfully I probably fail to verbally tell someone once a month even. I am betting I am not alone in this failure. If I was it would not be only 4%.
I feel quite ashamed of this. I think we all should if we are not out there completing the great commission. We have received the greatest gift possible. We were given 10 laws to live by, and we all failed. Yet God's through His infinite grace sent His only Son to suffer and die to pay for our sins, and He did all this knowing we would sin against him. So while we were yet sinners God gave us the way to receive eternal life in the perfectness of Heaven.

• Romans 5:7-9 7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Much more then, having now been justified by His blood, we shall be saved from wrath through Him.
• John 3:16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.
• Luke 19:10 "for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost.”
• 1 John 3:7-8 7 Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous. 8 He who sins is of the devil, for the devil has sinned from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.

And finally Jesus' last command before He ascended to Heaven

Acts 1:8 But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”

Under Pressure by Queen

Pressure pushing down on me
Pressing down on you, no man asked for
Under pressure, that burns a building down
Splits a family in two
Puts people on streets

That is the opening bit of Under Pressure by Queen. Who knew that Queen was speaking truth. We went out to grab some supper tonight and Under Pressure was playing at the restaurant. So that got me to thinking. We are all under pressure everyday. Some more than others. Every one's pressures are different, some finical pressures, some a strained relationship, some even addictions. But there are good things that come from pressure. Take diamonds for instance.

• "Well, believe it or not, diamonds are made of the same substance that the lead in your pencil and coal is made of. It's just that the atoms themselves are arranged in a way that make them tighter than any other substance. The bonds are formed when carbon exists at very high temperatures and under very high pressure. Natural diamonds are made very deep in the Earth about 180 km below the surface where high temperatures and pressure exist naturally. Under the earth’s crust is the mantel, which is made up of molten rock, metals and other materials.The high pressures are produced by the weight of 180 km of rocks pressing down on it. This is how the diamond comes to be."

This can be related to the Christian life. God puts us in struggles, under pressure, to change us. Wouldn't be nice if we could be under this pressure and come out like a diamond. Well I think that is God's intention. Pressure cause us to change and adapt, extreme pressure forces us to realize we must seek God to get us through the days of our lives.

• Psalm 63:1-3 1 O God, You are my God;Early will I seek You; My soul thirsts for You; My flesh longs for You In a dry and thirsty land Where there is no water. 2 So I have looked for You in the sanctuary, To see Your power and Your glory. 3 Because Your lovingkindness is better than life, My lips shall praise You.
• Hebrews 4:15-16 15 For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.
• Romans 12:2 And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.
• 2 Corinthians 12:10 Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

So next time you feel your pressures are to much, think about the diamonds. Take pleasure in your pressure and be the diamond. Seek Him early and often.

• 2 Corinthians 12:20-21 20 For I fear lest, when I come, I shall not find you such as I wish, and that I shall be found by you such as you do not wish; lest there be contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, backbitings, whisperings, conceits, tumults; 21 lest, when I come again, my God will humble me among you, and I shall mourn for many who have sinned before and have not repented of the uncleanness, fornication, and lewdness which they have practiced..