TODAY'S PROMISE

"If you then, being evil, know how to give

good gifts to your children, how much more

will your Father who is in heaven give what

is good to those who ask Him."  

(Matthew 7:11 NASB)  

LESSON FROM THE OLD TRUCK

You have seen old trucks before.  Even I know that.

And, there is nothing special about this one.

This one is an old 1979 Dodge Power Wagon.  I

used it for many, many years.  But I wanted something

smaller and lighter so this thing was set aside.  Then

after buying a newer smaller truck I just gave it to a

neighbor up the road a ways.

He used it to go fishing a lot around the various

farm ponds in the area.  But the point I want to 

make is how he spent a lot of time telling me what

a great hot rod he was going to make out of it.  He

was going to take the cab off and change a dozen 

other things.  That was fine with me.  But I knew

my neighbor.  After sitting at his house for a long

time he talked someone into painting it with a 

spray can.  That is what you see in the image above.

And that was as "hot rod" as it ever got. Then it sat 

and sat and sat.

I finally saw it hauled off on a wrecker.  My guess

is he traded it for a six pack of beer.

The same old truck with a little make up on the out

side.

The lesson.  I see what seems to be a lot of professed

"Christians" who seem to have changed the outside

some, or give a real good talk.  But, in actions they

seem to have the same old insides, mind, thoughts,

 attitudes and desires.

If truly we will turn our selves over to God and allow

him to work in us, it will make that "hot rod" out of

us.  But just being "churchy" will not do it.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

  "For God so loved the world,

that He gave His only begotten

Son, that whoever believes in 

Him shall not perish, but have

eternal life."  

(John 3:16 NASB)  

The best Christmas gift ever.

The very creator of the universe came down

and became a man named Jesus Christ who

out of love for his created beings died as a

sacrifice for our sins and failings.  Then offers

us eternal life to live with him for ever if we 

will but turn from the way we are going and

give our selves to him.

Don't ignore the greatest gift ever.

God does love you.

TODAY'S PROMISE

"But you shall serve the LORD your God,

and He will bless your bread and your 

water; and I will remove sickness from

your midst."

(Exodus 23:25 NASB)

ANOTHER THANK YOU JESUS

I know.  This picture probably would not mean a thing 

to you.  It's just a cut up tree.  But let me explain why it 

makes me happy, happy, happy.

You see about five years ago when I was only seventy-nine

years old I came down with "Aplastic anemia".  That means

that my body quit making blood.  I hope you know, you have

to have blood to live.  And I did not remember it, but being 

as I cannot spell all these neat words like, "Aplastic" and

"anemia" I pulled out one of my "primary care physician's"

reports to see how to spell it.  It also listed me as having

"Type 2 diabetes mellitus with diabetic chronic kidney

disease,"  what ever that is.

Yes, I had to live on other people's blood for about two

years.  That was a lot of hospital time.  But, I and a lot

of other people pray.

Back to being happy.  About four years ago if I wanted

to go down to my shop and do something, I could not even

walk it.  I would drive my truck the 150 to 200 ft. down or

back.  But God has been healing me.

The tree.  Last Friday night we had the worst storm I 

remember having here in the last forty-five years.  That

tree was blown over in the front yard.  So I decided I

wanted to get it out of the yard today.

Yep.  I cut it up as you can see, AND moved the three

truck loads of brush from it over to the burn pile all

today with time to spare.

Do you see why I am happy, happy, happy and have 

been thanking God all afternoon.

TODAY'S QUOTE

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"Our life is full of brokenness - broken 

relationships, broken promises, broken

expectations.  How can we live with that

brokenness without becoming bitter and

resentful except by returning again and

again to God's faithful presence in our 

lives."

-Henri Nouwen

TODAY'S PROMISE

"You shall walk in all the way which the Lord

your God has commanded you, that you may

live and that it may be well with you, and that

you may prolong your days in the land which

you will possess."  

(Deuteronomy 5:33 NASB)

THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD

THE LIGHT OF THE WORLD.

A few days ago while sitting in my recliner reading a

bright light shone in my eyes.  It was a very small beam

but when lined up just right it was as bright as an LED

light.

I of course begin to search for it's source.  It was coming

from a bouquet of flowers the wife has sitting on a stand.

You and I both know that flowers do not shine lights in 

your face.  And especially those.  They are artificial or 

fake flowers.

It was as you guessed, a reflection of the sun on something

in the bouquet.  

Hey!

That is the way I am supposed to be.  When Jesus Christ

was talking to his disciples he told them, "You are the light

of the world..."  But as you know, a disciple in and of themselves

are about as bright as mud, just like those fake flowers.

Another place Jesus said, "I am the light of the world."

Now we have it.  Like on a bright moon lit night the moon

really does not shine.  We know that it only reflects the light

of the sun.

That is the way it is supposed to work with us.  We are to 

live so close to Jesus Christ that the very life of Christ

reflects in and through us making us the light of the world.

May God help me to allow the life of Jesus Christ shine

through me.

TODAY'S QUOTE

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"For where love is wanting, the beauty

of all virtue is mere tinsel, is empty sound,

is not worth a straw, nay more is offensive

and disgusting."

-John Calvin

TODAY'S PROMISE

"So don't worry about these things, saying

'What will we eat?  What will we drink?  What

will we wear?'  These things dominate the 

thoughts of believers, but your heavenly 

Father already knows all your needs.  Seek

the Kingdom of God above all else, and live

righteously, and he will give you everything

you need."   

(Matthew 6:31-33 NLT)  

THE NEWS BEFORE IT HAPPENS

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THE NEWS BEFORE IT HAPPENS

   

Do you want to know what is going to happen

to this old world?  It is already written in The Book.

Do you want to know what is going to happen to

your country?  It is in The Book.

Do you want to know what is going to happen to

your people and your culture?  It's in The Book.

Do you want to know what is going to happen to

you as a person?  IT'S IN THE BOOK.

I grew up in a very peaceful and prosperous period

of time, at least in my country.  I would never have

imagined there could even be the turmoil that there

is today.  But it's here.

These days were foretold several thousand years

ago.  God knows in advance what is going to happen,

and in His mercy he has told us.  It's all in The Book;

that is The Holy Bible.   And the things he has told us

have been 100% accurate.  And if you think things are

bad now, it will scare the life out of you about what is

coming right where you live.

About sixty years ago I began to see what God told us

was coming.  So, I began to adjust my life for what is

coming.  In fact knowing what is coming is one of the

reasons that I left my place of birth, about forty-five

years ago, and moved to where I now live.  Why, because

I did not want to be in the area I was born in when these

times come.

Do you want to know what is going to happen before

it gets here?  Get yourself a "HOLY BIBLE" and read

it for yourself.  It can literally be a life saver.

TODAY'S QUOTE

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"There are many of us that are willing 

to do great things for the Lord,

but few of us are willing to do little things."  

-D.L. Moody

TODAY'S PROMISE

"But He was pierced through for our transgressions,

He was crushed for our iniquities;

The chastening for our well-being fell upon Him,

And by His scourging we are healed.

All of us like sheep have gone astray,

Each of us has turned to his own way;

But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all

To fall on Him."  

(Isaiah 53:5,6 NASB)

OVER LOADED

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OVER LOADED.

Are you overloaded?  I am.

A couple of generations ago, when I was just a kid

there was an old saying that said;

"Three moves equal one burnout."  The meaning being,

every time you move your home, or residence, you 

eliminate all the extra stuff you have so you do not 

have to take it with you.  Three moves that way and

you throw away enough stuff to equal the house being 

burned down.

A few years ago God enabled us to move into a new

house.  The old house was old when I bought it and

after living in it for 36 years it was even older.  A real

good description would be it was "wore out".

The new house is on the same piece of property so

it was not necessary to tear down the old house right

away.  Some places you could not get away with that.

But in this area we can.

Finally the time came to begin cleaning up and tearing

down the old house.  WOW!  I do not know how else

to say it.  I could not believe how much was in the old

house that needed to be given away, sold, recycled or

thrown away.  And we have lived several years without

needing any of it.   So, why did we have it to start with?

Life seems to be that way.  We gain a lot of excess stuff

that we just have to have.  Then we go rent a storage

building to hold all the stuff we don't need to start with.

God speaking through the Apostle Paul said;

"For we have brought nothing into the world,

so we cannot take anything out of it either."  

(1 Timothy 6:7 NASB) 

Personally over the last few years I have been getting

rid of a lot of "stuff".  Believe it or not, the less I have

the less work and worry I have.  I am enjoying it. I can

either spend more time enjoying life or, and more 

important, preparing myself for that day thats coming

when I stand before God and give an account of myself.

TODAY'S QUOTE

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"The Christian life is not a constant high.

I have moments of deep discouragement.

I have to go to God in prayer with tears in

my eyes, and say, 'O God, forgive me,' or

'Help me.'"

- Billy Graham

TODAY'S PROMISE

"For the LORD God is our sun and out shield.

He give us grace and glory.

The LORD will withhold no good thing

from those who do what is right."

(Psalms 84:11 NLT)  

THE STOVE

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My wife cleans houses by choice.  At her age  I wish

she  would go ahead and retire.  But she wants to continue.

Her claim is that it makes her get up and go where she 

would be come a couch potato other wise and truly she

enjoys doing it.  [I do notice that she also loves to shop.]

My wife is a woman who has a personal relationship

with Jesus Christ.  Not just religious, or churchy, but

a real vital relationship with Jesus.  The result is that

she prays about every thing, and especially trouble.

A short time ago she was cleaning house for some 

people up by the country club.  When trying to put

a pot or pan away above their kitchen stove she 

dropped the pan on the stove.  You guessed it, it is

a stove with some type of glass top.  It broke a small

place in the glass.  She said the Devil tempted her to

not tell them.  But being a woman of God she prayed

and decided to tell them what happened and offered 

to pay for the damages.

She went and got the husband and wife telling 

them what happened.  Both the husband and wife

just begin laughing.   The stove was obsolete and had 

several problems that parts could not be acquired for.

 So, they were planing to get another one anyway.

My wife came home thanking and praising God.

The next time she when to this home to clean

they met her with a hug.  It had prompted them

to go ahead and do their stove shopping.  By

going shopping when they did they came across

a stove they were very happy with that had been

ordered by someone and never picked up.  They

were able to get it at the dealers cost and saved

a large amount of money.

You can bet my wife will continue praying to 

the one who gives her life and help in times

of trouble.

TODAY'S QUOTE

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"Through many dangers, toils, and snares,

I have already come;

Tis grace hath brought me safe thus far,

And grace will lead me home."

- John Newton

TODAY'S PROMISE

"Greed causes fighting;

trusting the Lord leads to prosperity

Those who trust their own insight are

foolish,

but anyone who walks in wisdom 

is safe."  

(Proverbs 28:25,26 

MAKE ME LIKE GARLIC

I have a garlic bed that I want to convert over to something

else.  That is, a bed of something else.

You gardeners can laugh at me all you want.  I cannot hear

you from here.  But my futile efforts go something like this.

I first took the rototiller and went through the bed tilling it

up real fine and throwing out all the garlic bulbs I found.

Thinking I was ready to plant the next crop something delayed

me a few weeks.

Ha, ha, ha, ha.  

In that couple of weeks a whole mess of garlic started

growing again.  So, I hand dug them up, and,threw them 

in a bucket.  I did not want to let them grow somewhere 

else resulting in my simply dumping them on an old 

out side work bench about October the sixth or a few days

 before. That is the image above.

In the mean time I have done nothing, nothing, nothing,

to help the unwanted garlic.  They were left there on the 

bench to die.  In the image below you can see they have

gathered some fall leaves, but look, they are growing 

there on that wooden bench on November the ninth.

Back to the bed.

I thought I had it taken care of this time.  WRONG.

Small garlic plants began coming up about the size of

grass.  I tried raking them all out, or so I thought.  It

looked good - for a few days.  Then more small plants.

You guessed it.

I have not planted anything else in there yet.

What is my point?

God put life in a garlic plant that can be real hard to

kill out.  Because I have a relationship with Jesus Christ

I have the life of God in me also.  And I want that life to

be as tenacious in me as garlic's life is in it.

But garlic stinks.

If you smell it on someone's breath, yep.

But if you smell garlic bread being made,

you get hungry.  And, garlic is good for you too.

Regarding a Christian.  By that I mean a real 

Christian, somebody who has whole heartedly

turned to God and taken Jesus Christ into their 

life to be their Lord and master.  The Apostle 

Paul has this to say; 

"For we are a fragrance of Christ to God

among those who are being saved and among

those who are perishing; to the one an aroma

from death to death, to the other an aroma

from life to life."  

(2 Corinthians 2:15,16 NASB) 

May God help me make my life a pleasing fragrance

or aroma to God even if it "stinks" to the world.

TODAY'S QUOTE

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"In Proverbs we read: 'He that winneth souls is wise.'

If any man, woman or child by a godly life and example

can win one soul to God, his life will not have been a

failure.  He will have outshone all the mighty men of his

day, because he will have set a stream in motion that will 

flow on and on forever and ever."

-D.L. Moody

TODAY'S PROMISE

"For the LORD God is our sun and our shield.

He gives us grace and glory.

The LORD will withhold no good thing 

from those who do what is right.

O LORD of Heaven's Armies,

what joy for those who trust in you."

(Psalms 84:11,12 NLT)

TODAY'S QUOTE

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"The sweetest lesson I have learned in God's

school is to let the Lord choose for me."

- D. L. Moody

TODAY'S PROMISE

"Those who plant in tears

will harvest with shouts of joy.

They weep as they go to plant their seed,

but they sing as they return with

the harvest."  

(Psalms 126:5,6 NLT)

TODAY'S QUOTE

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"When we believe that God is Father, we also believe

that such a Father's hand will never cause His child

a needless tear.  We may not understand life any bet-

ter, but we will not resent life any longer."  

-William Barclay

WARPED VALUES

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WARPED VALUES.

I just read on the internet how a woman vows to teach

her youngest child how to properly open packages

and boxes so it will be unnecessary to use zip lock bags. 

Her concern is not adding plastic to the environment.

Now that is a noble vow.  We have far too much 

human trash in the environment now.

BUT, BUT, BUT.

I also happen to know this woman and her family quit

well.  There is also an older sibling.  And the older sibling,

well simply put, is a lier and a thief to the point most of us

simply do not want them around.  [A point you will understand,

this is one of those "Mamma's little darling can do

no wrong".]

Would it not be better to spend some time teaching these

kids (children) some morals and ethics?  With a good 

moral or ethical grounding the kid is going to have some

concern about other people and the environment they

live in.

Is it any wonder that the whole world is turned upside

down?

TODAY'S PROMISE

"Therefor dear brothers and sisters, you

have no obligation to do what your sinful

nature urges you to do.  For if you live by

its dictates, you will die.  But if through the

power of the Spirit you put to death the 

deeds of your sinful nature, you will live.  

For all who are led by the Spirit of God are

 children of God."

(Romans 8:12-14 NLT)  

THE WAY THEY WALK

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You have noticed it to.  The way he/she/it walks tells

you what it is.  For example, in the distance you see an

animal but you do not know if it is a dog or something

else.  When it starts to walk, trot or run, you know that

it is a fox.   Because that is the way a fox walks or runs.

You see a very small animal where you cannot get a good

look at it.  When it moves, if it hops, it's a rabbit. etc.

In this day and age it often is difficult to tell whether a

person walking down the side walk is a male or female.

But if you will observe for a little bit you usually can

tell if it's a male or female because there is just something

different about the way they walk.

I am finding a lot of confusion about people today.

In days past the way some people walked, i.e. lived,

and talked did not match up.  Or we would say that 

their walk did not match their talk.   They talked a 

real good story.  But their life showed and entirely 

different story.

I am not a real social person.  I have a few good solid

friends and am content with that.  But lately I have 

been involved in the so called social media, i.e., Facebook

in particular.  Wow!  What an eye opener.  It seems that

there are a lot of people out there that can talk a real good

talk.  They will say something, or share a post that could

have came right out of the Holy Bible it's self.

Then the next six posts from the same person could have

come right out of the pit of Hell it's self.

Jesus Christ said,

"For whatever is in your heart determines

what you say"  

(Matthew 12:34 NLT)  

 Now which talk or walk am I to believe?

Something seems hypocritical in this.

I suppose the answer is found the Holy Bible.

Be patient with me.  I will include a long portion

of Scripture to make my point.  See if you do not think

these are the days we are living in.  The last sentence

is really the one I am after so I will capitalize it.

"You should know this, Timothy, that in the last

days there will be very difficult times.  For people

will love only themselves and their money.  They

will consider nothing sacred.  They will be unloving

and unforgiving; they will slander others and have

no self-control.  They will be cruel and hate what

is good.  They will betray their friends, be reckless,

be puffed up with pride, and love pleasure rather 

than God.  THEY WILL ACT RELIGIOUS, BUT

THEY WILL REJECT THE POWER THAT 

COULD MAKE THEM GODLY."

(2 Timothy 3:1 - 5 NLT)   

With God's help I want to seek the power from

Him to live a "godly" life and walk the walk that 

would match  a godly talk.

TODAY'S QUOTE

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"I am not what I ought to be.

I am not what I want to be.

I am not what I hope to be.

But still, I am not what I used to be. 

And by the grace of God,

I am what I am."

  

- John Newton

THE CAT

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One of the things my wife does is pet sit.  It works well

for her and pays well also.  For about the last week she

has been taking care of an elderly lady's cats.  In this case

the wife just drops by once a day and takes care of all the

cat needs.

Earlier this week my wife stopped by to take care of the

cats as we were on our way to a funeral.  The old lady

lives in a large expensive house in a gated community.

One of the things that got my attention was that there was

lots of room in the house.  It was vary spacious.  Not packed

with furniture or filled with all kinds of stuff.  Just very 

simple.  I loved it.

In the process of getting me in [and out of her way] we

accidentally left the kitchen door open to the garage and

one of the garage doors was up about eight or ten inches.

The lady has six cats and a number of them had found their

way into the garage.  But one of the cats could not be located.

My wife has hunted for that cat for four days now.  All to

no avail.  We both have been praying over the matter.  It

is a serious matter to us to take care of peoples pets and 

then loose them.  So a lot of prayer and hunting has gone

into finding that cat.

My wife left a note of apology to the lady who was to 

come home today.  The elderly lady called my wife to

tell her she was home and ALL of the cats were there.

We do not know if that cat was hiding on a chandelier,

or if God opened the front door and pushed it in.  But as 

far as we are concerned, God answered our prayers.

PRAISE GOD FOR RETURNING A CAT.