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)