Pleasure Seekers

“Woe unto them…and the harp, and the lute, the timbres, and flute, and wine, are in their feasts; but they regard not the work of the LORD, neither consider the operation of his hands”  (Isaiah 5:11-12).

 

There is a way that seems right unto man, but afterwards it yields death. When mankind refuses to recognize the operation or the working of the will of God, then he or she will find death and loss at the end of their pleasure seeking.

 

There are too many people, especially the youth of today, who are in desperate need of some mentors who will love them to Jesus. God is looking for someone to get up from the table and work with the God of orphans. There are too many women who have been abused by men’s lusts. God is looking for someone to come alongside and to love them to the bosom of Christ.

 

America and other countries are in a stupor. They are drunken with pleasure While we take our pleasure trips, buy our modern things, God is looking for someone to stand in the gap. It takes a wise man to recognize that the ways of the world are coming to an end.

 

It is God who gave us all things to enjoy. And it is God who will take it away. Push yourself away from the table of pleasure and go get someone and feed them the bread of life.

 

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  • God Does Not Budge

    “Then the Lord said to me, Even if Moses and Samuel stood before Me. My mind would not be favorable toward this people. Cast them out of my sight, and let them go forth” (Jeremiah 15:1).

    One would think that God would hear the prayer of His servant Moses and Samuel in any circumstance. But here we learn that the people of God were resilient in their behavior unfavorably before God. They were recalcitrant and rebellious.

    Jeremiah is heavy in heart. He is running out of steam. He has prayed, prayed, and prayed some more and yet he is not seeing the God of Israel move. God doesn’t even seem to care about saving them out of their upcoming judgment and Jeremiah is also caught in the judgment.

    What do we do when America doesn’t seem to understand? What do we do when our children and grandchildren do not understand and we don’t seem to get our prayers answered? We have to be taught like Jeremiah to run with the footmen, and to contend with the horses. Don’t wear out where you are but look up to where God is.

    Our source of grace is found in the Lord. Our strength is found in Him. Things are going to get worse but we need to get better. Don’t run from your assignments because it doesn’t matter where you are God has you there to train you, to form you, and to fill you.

    Though the world loves to wander away from God, nor restrain their feet from living in pleasure, don’t you do it? Keep on the line with God. Let God toughen you! Things are going to get worse but let God make you the man or woman of God you need to be.

  • Either Change Your Message or Change Your Address

    “But first must he [Jesus] suffer many things, and be rejected by this generation” (Luke 17:25).

    The prophets of the Old Testament met great opposition. Ministry is nice when it’s a suburb and, manicured, quiet, well-kept place to come and wash feet. It’s nice when there’s fruit. When there’s encouragement. When there’s hope. When there’s appreciation. When there’s spiritual hunger. When there’s a readiness to change. When there’s a passion for Christ. When it’s yours and God blesses and blesses and blesses. It’s nice, isn’t it?

    Jeremiah was told by Jehovah God, “Therefore thou shalt speak all these words unto them, but they will not hearken to thee; thou shalt also call unto them, but they will not answer thee” (Jeremiah 7:27). Jeremiah was told by the people to either change your message or change your address. They would not hear or listen to his warning.

    This was Main Street in Dodge City at high noon. This was the greatest of all fights. But Jeremiah stood his ground. Most people don’t. They run. They hide. They say, “I never signed up for this course.” There is a great gulf between heaven and hell. When people choose to serve themselves, their self, and refuse God’s glory then there is hell on earth. And Jeremiah felt the heat of it!

    What about us? Do we yearn to quit? How far will we walk away before we turn back? Many serve God with strings attached. Jeremiah was disappointed but He did not get tangled in the strings. He was committed to God’s calling upon his life. People want to go where it is easy, while the thrust of ministry is not easy. Jesus promised it! If it was not simple and easy for the Lord Jesus then why do we think it would be for us?

     

     

     

     

  • The Shepherds: Changed by God

    “And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things that they had heard and seen, as it was told unto them” (Luke 2:20).

     There was only one explanation for the lives of the shepherds: God! There should be only one explanation for our lives: God!

     The Shepherds believed God. The Angels appeared to them and told them there was a Savior, Lord, the Messiah born and given unto them and for the whole world. They left the scene and searched for the babe wrapped in swaddling cloths.

    These Shepherds were men who were not counted worthy of anything appearing to them from heaven, yet God thought so. They felt unworthy by their peers and yet God said that they were of value. The religious crowd considered them unclean, unintellectual, and unattached, but God appeared unto them and touched them by angels.

    Afterwards the men left in search for the Lord Jesus, found Him lying in the manger and told everyone of what and who they had seen. They went on with God and didn’t stop telling the good news. The appearance of the Living Word changed their lives.

    After we meet the Lord Jesus we want to be like Him. We have a sincere desire for the Word. A man without an appetite for God’s Word causes us to wonder if he is saved. We will desire as the shepherds did to be like Jesus.

    There should be only one explanation for our lives. “God” is the only explanation for what we are and what we are doing. If we can explain it on any other level, we are a failure. Most Christians’ lives can be explained on a basis other than the work of God. The shepherds represent what happens when we see the face of God.

     

  • Cream Puff or Rattlesnake

    “God sacrificed Jesus on the altar of the world to clear that world of sin. Having faith in Him sets us clear”

    (Rom. 3:25 MSG).

     

    One Sunday President Calvin Coolidge, a man of few words, attended church. Upon his return from the service he was asked what the sermon was about. He responded, “sin.”

     

    “Well, what did the preacher say about it?”

     

    “He said he’s against it,” replied Coolidge.
    No Christian can live with sin – day in and day out, year in and year out, without even the slightest change or attempt to stop – and remain a Christian! Christianity without any change in behavior over the long haul is synthetic Christianity – it is a false assurance. We either go to God in repentance and turn away from our sin, or we give over to sin.
    Here is the truth of the matter, we need to be afraid of sin. We have to treat it more deadly than a rattlesnake. That means we never dally with it.
    You play with fire, you will get burnt. You mess with a snake, you get bit. You dabble in sin, you slide down the slippery slope that separates from God. There is NOTHING more dangerous than accepting and excusing sin…that has the power to cast into hell.
    As we walk through life we need to follow the Appalachian warning about river trails: NEVER stop watching for rattlers! We have got to be alert and be on our guard. Sin can creep up when we least expect it.
    When it does we need to do as Barney Fife says, “Nip it in the bud.” We need to root it out even before it is a half-formed thought, before it is said…before it is done. Don’t touch sin with a ten-foot pole. And if you do, deal with it immediately.
    Stay close to Christ. Stay in God’s Word. Read it. Meditate upon it. Eat it. Memorize it. Pray it through.

  • Overflowing to Empower

    “Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit” (Ephesians 5:18).
    Paul places two images before us–drunkenness and being filled with the Holy Spirit.

    There are certain things that drive people to drink. The pressures of life, the demands that are severe that lead to some type of stimulation to overcome it. There are some things in life that causes one to take a drink to undergird, to give confidence, to help, and to give strength. There are a lot of situations that stir people to drink.

    In contrast Paul says that we are to be filled with the Holy Spirit.  For He will stimulate, strengthen, subdue the human failures and feelings and satisfy us with His workings. There is no shame to feel the sense of need. We were not made to be self-sufficient, independent creatures. We need Someone to help us feel adequate to face life; do not be troubled by that.

    Herein is the real and great secret of Christianity. It is the possibility of being filled with the Spirit of Christ. Each child of God has the Holy Spirit living in them, but many are not filled with the Holy Spirit. They have the Holy Spirit but the Holy Spirit does not have them. The Holy Spirit is present but He is not president. He is resident but He is not residing. He resides in you but maybe He does not preside through you. He is our inner supply for every need.

    Christianity is not just about coming to church, getting a blessing, and then going away to live in the light and warmth of the blessing until it leaks away. No, we have much more than that. We drink {believe} into Him and “Out of his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water,” John says, “By this he meant the Spirit, whom those who believed in him were later to receive” (John 7:39a). That is the strengthening that comes from within, and He is plenty for the situation. So drink in and drink up, for by Him we live and move and have our being.

     

     

     

     

  • Don’t Lose the Wonder

    “There are three things which are too wonderful for me” (Proverbs 30:18). 

     

    Science may be able to explain the flight of birds, the movements of serpents, the currents of the atmosphere and of the ocean, and human sexuality, but that does not take away from the wonder of it all.
    Life and love are not explained in the laboratory. Experiments or the formulas which are convenient to the experts do not take away the splendor and awe of God’s creation and created order.
    So many times as we go through life, we tend to lose the sense of wonder. We become farsighted and forgetful linked to unthankfulness.  If someone lives near the ocean you can find in any day many who have not been to the shoreline all year. The stars shine above us and yet we forget that they do. The birth of a baby happens and we share stares and looks and comments but it’s “just a newborn.”
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