Thursday 5 August 2021

Knowing What is Best

I have a little rescue dog, called Shy. Who, a couple of nights ago was poorly with tummy trouble, she kept getting up and needing to go out. The following day she was not herself, but she knew what was best for her, she didn’t eat anything until she felt better. It wasn’t long before she was back to her old self.


It made me think about we Christians who, when we are spiritually sick, and know what is best for us, but don’t always do it. We try desperately hard to sort it out our way, we want to get back into fellowship with the Father and will try all sorts of things rather than repenting and trusting God to help us and build us up again. Scripture tells us that we are not to lean on our own understanding, our understanding is limited, it is often clouded with a world view, but when we repent and put our trust in God and His Word, we soon feel better, our fellowship with the Father and our Lord Jesus is restored, and we wonder why we ever tried our own way first.

We have to remember what is best for us, and that is putting ourselves in God's hands, studying His Word, and believing His Word, and acting on His Word, the reason this is best for us is because God knows better than we do what is best for us, and we can trust Him because He is faithful and just.

So, how do we know what is best for us, by giving everything over to God.



Saturday 20 February 2021

Don’t try a cover up

I recently saw a lady with brilliant white trainers on, while I was walking the dog.

I wondered how on earth she was going to keep them so white.

It took me back to when I was a teenager, you could buy a product

for whitening your tennis shoes.

You’d press the sponge on your shoe and it would cover all the marks, etc.

It didn’t actually clean them,

it just covered everything up, and made them look clean.

It made me think about man’s attitude to the faults and sins, we deceive ourselves if we think that by all these modern methods such as:

Mindfulness

Positive thinking

Self improvement

Conscience awareness

Counselling, etc. etc. we can ever cover up our secret faults and sins.

You can deceive others, you can deceive yourself but you can never deceive God. You may say “I don’t believe in God” but just because you don’t believe doesn’t mean He doesn’t exist. God’s existence doesn’t depend on man’s belief. I was recently in a conversation with a gentleman on Twitter, who said he had put his Bible down and accepted there was no God. How foolish would we consider the man who turned off the mains power to his electricity and said “electricity doesn’t exist.” 

God exists, and He created everything, including man, who disobeyed Him and so sin entered into the heart of man, and men have been born sinners since. We all have moral standards, some are higher than others, but all men are answerable to God’s standards. If someone breaks man’s laws they are punished, and whoever breaks God’s laws will be punished. So if all men and women are sinners, and are destined to judgment, condemnation, and eternal punishment by God, what can we do to put it right? Nothing. 

God sent His Son into our world, He was a human being as we are, but still God and so He was sinless. He took our place. Jesus, was punished for my sins and for your sins. This is God’s love toward man, as He doesn’t want anyone to perish, but to have everlasting life. Can we earn this? No, do we deserve this? No. It is all a free gift of God’s grace. We must come to God with a repentant heart, we must ask for His forgiveness through His Son, and we must believe in Jesus and turn away from our old life and God will give us a new heart.  There’s no cover up, God doesn’t try and whiten up the old wicked heart, the Bible tells us that God gives us a new heart and that we are then new creatures in Christ Jesus.


Don’t try and cover up your sins,
the thing I remember with that whitener was that it didn’t last long,
the marks and stains soon showed through again.
And no matter how much you try and cover up your sins,
they will soon show through again.



Monday 18 January 2021

Harmony

Wrong key. During lockdown I have been posting video clips on TiKTok. I read the Bible and sing. Once a week my sister and I get together and record duets, These we put on various media platforms including TikTok. I like the fact that others can record a duet with you, we have had a few people sing with us on one particular song. ' 'The garden" Today as I was looking through my notifications I saw some one had 'dueted’ with us on a keyboard. But, 0, it did not sound good as he was playing in a different key. Pamela and I tend to lower the key when we sing, as we both now struggle to reach the high notes, I thought about this, how we adjust the key to our own personal preference, and how many people who claim to be “Christian" do the same with God’s Word. The religious leaders at the time of Jesus, would not believe Him, He warned them many times, but they would not listen, even though they had the scriptures, that they could check His words and actions with. 

John 8:47 He that is of God heareth God’s words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.

How many in these days are not singing from the same song sheet, and yet they want to be united with those who are. We are to be a discerning people, we are to study the scriptures and live our lives according to God's word, not man's false interpretation of it. If what we hear from the pulpit doesn't line up with God’s Word then we should walk away from that denomination. Pamela and I choose the key we want to sing in to suit our voices. You can't do that with Christianity. You can't choose the bits you like in the Bible and leave the rest. You can't decide on its meaning so it fits in with your sin lifestyle. You will be out of tune. You will not be in tune with God, you will be singing your own tune.