F4S: September 2009

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Sometimes Healing Doesn't Arrive How Or When We Want It To


We don't always get what we want, but we can still lean on the trustworthy One. Prayer is like the soil for growth, hope and healing as we look to Christ!

Science tries to prove cause and effect. In facing real sickness, faith directs us to call on the power of our loving God and boldly ask. His ways we can rarely understand but we can always trust. Thanks for the grace; it's sufficient! Don't know what it's for Lord, but Your will be done! Be glorified in me!

Know anyone seriously sick that you would like prayer for?

Obviously God never intended for sickness and disease to be a part of the human experience down here on earth, but due to our own choices and this sin-cursed situation, it kinda makes one think when he has a friend facing a serious health challenge ahead.


Contrary to popular belief in different denominational circles, we Christians are not exempt from all the pains of this life. Duh!

I personally think that when God allows an unregenerate person to get Cancer ..or say Lu Garrets disease ..it really breaks His heart and He really weeps with those who weep. We need to be there with em, genuinely care and weep with them too.

One gets cancer, and then God allows a Christian to get Cancer too. Not like: "There you go saint, it's even now." 

But why? Dunno all the reasons, but He does allow it sometimes so that the watching world can clearly see the difference in how they suffer, and then hopefully turn to Him for the greatest kinds of healing (Receiving full forgiveness in a born again relationship with God is the greatest miracle Christ still works)! God has healed me before following believing prayer and it was because He wanted to bless His child, but also because He had others in mind--others who needed the ultimate healing (spiritual healing). What a joy it was just to lead some of my friends to Christ!


Yes, there is something worse than having cancer—it's needlessly having un-forgiven sin in your life when Jesus said He'd deal with that for free if you just ask Him too ..and He has basically already dealt with it on the cross. We just simply need to repent and believe, but you've already heard about that I'm sure.

"..Jesus Christ—He is Lord of all—that word you know, which was proclaimed throughout all Judea, and began from Galilee after the baptism which John preached: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him" (Acts 10:36-38, nkjv).

"Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever" (Heb. 13:8).

"The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much" (Jam. 5:16).

My prayer is a simple one, Lord: whatever is best for me, do;
In sickness, in health I desire what brings the most glory to You. —Fasick

"..to another faith by the same Spirit, and to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit" (1 Cor. 12:9, nasb).

Read more on this topic….

Yeah, just musing on this stuff a bit.  

Monday, September 14, 2009

Age Abiding Life – Have You Experienced It?

It's still a little wet and rainy here in Dallas today, but I am enjoying it. Liney and I just grab an unbrella and go out to do a couple miles in it. No one else seems to be out there. Hope you are having a nice day today as well. I really had some fun the other day helping some German visitors here that I hadn't seen in a long while, to get around town. They really wanted to eat some good steak and see some large ranches ..and we do have some here. It was also funny to see them go home wearing cowboy hats and carrying a longhorn rack with fur on it for their home office. Enjoyed seeing them enjoy it all.

Now here is a devo for you ..not so you can have "your best life now", like the hear and now is what we live for, but it's simply on God's kind of "life" for you. It abundant and full and exuberant--one that is everlasting as we fellowship with the Lord on His terms! My prayer is that this little devo-blog will uplift you, comfort you, inspire you and encourage you in how God has so much more ahead for you spiritually.


Age Abiding Life – Got It?


“I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly. ‘I am the good Shepherd. The good Shepherd gives His life for the sheep.’”
~Jesus, John 10:9-11

I once heard of a grand sculpted angel with big wings on it ..where the creator of it had invited the master artist of his day, Michelangelo, to come and carefully inspect it. Feedback from him could only be a positive thing for sure.


And the gracious invitation to this man of fame actually got a “Yes” response. How wonderfully exciting!


When Michelangelo arrived on the scene, the younger artist was thrilled and had him check out his statue as best he could ..and that is what he did ..in silence, looking closely at the outward form from different angles in that room.


"Well, it lacks only one thing!" said Michelangelo as he turned on his heal and quite mater-of-factly exited the abode.


Wow, he was gone and that was abrupt. Was he upset with the statues inferior workmanship or of the substance from which it was made?


Later on the young artist had his friend go and stop by Michelangelo’s place to tactfully find out what he meant when he said what he did after inspecting the angel. For you see, that young artist still wanted to learn from the master in his field of Art.


And it was there at his own personal studio, that Mister Michelangelo went on to explain it ..saying, "It merely lacks life!"


A person-form lacking life? Have you ever met anyone like that? Perhaps they have a beautiful form and appearance outwardly, but they are simply cold and dead on the inside? In truth, there are a whole lot of people in every city like that today. They don’t lack material splendor, they just lack life. You know, the right kind of life.


You and I cannot experience a full and abundant life if we are living with stony hard hearts.. if we are living independent of Christ who made us.. if we are living in fear, or in hatred and unforgivness ..or in passive unbelief—if we are simply living in sin.


When we are born of the Spirit and walk by faith in Jesus, we will see each day of the Christian life as a battle-challenge to be met, but also as an adventurous life of exceedingly great glory and joy!


God has given life abundant—live it fully every day;
Though our time on earth is fleeting, He goes with us all the way. ~Hess

Today I have given you the choice between life and death, between blessings and curses. I call on heaven and earth to witness the choice you make. Oh, that you would choose life, that you and your descendants might live! Choose to love the Lord your God and to obey Him and commit yourself to Him, for He is your life.
~ Deuteronomy 30:19-20

Do not live minimally. Live life to the maximum! Climb that mountain with confidence! ~David C. Egner

I have met parents with healthy kids before and having all the things that society says a family must have to be happy, but in reality, they claimed they weren’t happy at all. Some even soon afterwords ..ended their sad marriage. Many end it after the kids move out. Tragic!!!


I have met singles who worked hard all the way through expensive colleges and some even landed primo professional careers.. having a good degree of favor with their new partners in the firm.. but they now somehow felt sad at the top of their mountain, saying they were still empty inside. Some say it wasn't what they thought it would be.


I have met teenagers who have different eating disorders.. some wanting more and more control over their daily experience that seems badly disjointed and so they literally starve themselves to the point of near death existence.. hoping for beauty and lasting love. And other teens I’ve met, desperately try to fill that inner spiritual void inside by eating their way into a morbidly obese state. We seem to have more and more in this situation every year.


Many people with money and toys galore keep laughing and pretending that they are living to the fullest, but when they are all alone with their fancy clothes hung up.. they recognize that there is something significant still lacking. The haute couture labels, the mountain top real-estate on the lake, the wooden yacht on the bay, the fast red Italian and German sports cars—none of it really satisfies. They soon must buy something else for temporary fun. Many people watch the years and their youth fly away like the wind, and yet they are still lacking abundant life. They spend and spend trying to stay young or handsome ..like Michael Jackson did.


I think that’s why we see so many turning to prescription drugs too ..as he did.. and to other self destructive extremes.


Take some time to read in John's Gospel where Christ explains what is going on behind the curtain if you will. Knowing our time here would be so limited, Jesus admonished us about true life with all earnestness ..warning, "I am the door. If anyone enters… I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly. The good Shepherd gives His life.." (Jn. 10:9-11, nkjv).


What can we do? Please consider telling the devil that you want to break things off with him and be done with his worldly plan for you. Don’t worry, I don’t mean in some weird drawn out extended kind of hyper-televangelistic conversation. Just be brief.


Have you ever put on airs before to make like everything in your life is OK? Have you ever deceived anyone, or told one lie, or lusted after even another person. My opinion doesn’t really matter, but God says that’s wrong.


Have you ever been greedy ..or had a bad attitude and felt like punching out some jerk who really let you down? Have you ever been jealous of what another person had when you felt like you deserved it?


Man, who hasn’t blown it at some time or another and broken God’s Top Ten List? Please do carefully think about what the Bible teaches regarding true repentance, vertical faith, free forgiveness because of the cross at Calvary, and about establishing a two-way satisfying relationship with God through, Christ.


In that passage, Jesus was basically contrasting what He had to offer verses what the devil offers you. Yup, the thief mentioned in that Gospel is none other than the enemy of our soul, Mr LuCifer (a.k.a. Satan).


He literally hates you and has an uber-horrible plan for your life ..which includes ripping you off of anything good ..slowly or preferably faster, killing you anyway he can.. slowly with smoking, drinking, selfishness or preferably suddenly and fast in an unexpected way, and also totally destroying you and the very thought of you. Kill, steal and destroy via the lust of the eyes, the lusts of the flesh and or the pride of life—those are still his three goals and his three kinds of trap for you!


But why merely get all hung up on the negative when there is a life for you that is better? Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil, and so that we might have life and that we might have it more abundantly. He came to seek and to save that which is lost—confused people only knowing of one physical birth.


Life during life—it’s there for you! Respond to God today! The choice is yours.