SEATING CAPACITY – – – SENDING CAPACITY

I recently heard this on American Family Radio.

Excellent evaluation for a church—

Instead of declaring your church’s seating capacity,
What is your church’s sending capacity ?

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I believe the same thought could be modified to apply to the home and family.

THE BIBLE – – – NOT ENOUGH ?

When pastors, teachers, theologians share Bible verses about God, they allow the Word of God to teach about God, with simplicity, beauty, and power.

Whenever they use the word trinity to teach about God, they immediately plunge into elevating man’s words above God’s Word—His words about Himself are insufficient—they have to add.

It has become a knee-jerk action/reaction to always say trinity, never pausing to realize it does no good.
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God’s Words about God: Bible verses
+SIMPLICITY
+BEAUTY
+POWER
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Man’s words about God: explaining trinity
+COMPLETELY COMPLICATED
+NOTHING PRETTY
+MISERABLY WEAK

GUILT BY ASSOCIATION (reprint)

Note: This is a reprint from December 17, 2012

There has always been a significant factor in legal matters known as “guilt by association.”  Judicial rulings confirm that “bad company corrupts good . . .”

With the rise of analyzing everything psychologically in recent decades, we have a very real and troublesome twist on the reasonable conclusion of “guilt by association.”  It is now superseded and replaced with “guilt by accusation.”

Without my explaining, I’m sure you can easily come up with examples and applications in today’s world.  Here are some of mine:

ONE—–I first realized the application in marriage disputes and marriage counseling.  It is one of those handy tools that are easily employed to manipulate friends and professionals alike to take your side.  Just say that someone is controlling, and you gain immediate sympathy without evidence, and the other person is at a loss without defense.  Needless to say, that example is only the tip of the iceberg.

TWO—–“Intolerant” is perhaps the best tool or weapon to sling and make “guilt by accusation” stick.  Again, how do you defend against a charge of intolerance?

THREE—–“You don’t have the right to offend me” is another classic angle currently used to the point of absurdity.  Sadly, the courts have lost all sanity in bowing down to yet another wave of anti-God and anti-American ideology sweeping over this country—sweeping us away like a tsunami.

FOUR—–“Israel (or U.S.) military killed civilians” gets full press and ensuing international sentiment against the good guys.  Reality is—the other side is usually committing such atrocities more, by ten to one.

FIVE—–“We must be more reasonable and understanding with terrorists [who have all vowed to kill us].”  America’s unfounded guilt trip spread around the world the past four years is killing us now.

SIX—– Hate Crimes.  Thought Crimes.  (need I explain?)

SEVEN—–“Extremists are always wrong.”  (that would include Jesus)

EIGHT—–“You must limit your fight for life, family, and religious freedom to the democratic process and non-violence.  Anything more than that negates your cause—guilty, even if you just think or talk about it.”

—Where would that leave us with England 236 years ago?

—Where would that leave us with England 200 years ago?

—Where would that leave us with slavery 160 years ago?

—Where would that leave us with Germany 100 years ago?

—Where would that leave us with Germany and Japan 70 years ago?

—Now, where has that left us with God out of schools for 50 years?

—Now, where has that left us with killing a whole lot more babies than last Friday, for 40 years?

—Now, where has that left us with bowing to gay ‘rights’ for 30 years?

—Now, where does that leave us with the blitzkrieg dictatorship currently blowing up every single thing listed in this paragraph for 4 years?

—Now, where does this “guilt by accusation” (which we allow by free will, nationally and individually) leave us today, and tomorrow?

—Where does it leave the rest of our babies that are still alive?

—Where does it leave our marriages that are still God-ordained?

—Where does it leave our faith and freedom we still have to tell others about freedom from all guilt, with Jesus?

Is not this something worth fighting for, again, like others did for us?  What measures were they willing to use, for us?  What measures are we willing to use, for our children?

NINE—–Another example on the individual level, that affects the entire country:

This one explains the dramatic rise in child abuse for the past several decades.  We had an entire generation conditioned without authority and confidence in parenting.  They were told,

—“You don’t have the right to discipline with physical pain.”

—“You have to earn the respect of your children first.”

—“You have to reason with your children.”

—“If your children don’t act right, figure out what you are doing wrong.”

When parents start off feeling guilty and reluctant to discipline quickly enough to instill instant regret, they delay the inevitable.  Pressure builds and defiance escalates, and ultimately the parent lashes out abusively instead of authoritatively.

TEN—–Now the most volatile current “guilt by accusation”:

“Guns are the cause of violent crime.”  That gets a lot of mileage at a time like this.

Just say “NO”  to gun control.  Don’t let anyone make you or anyone else feel guilty for owning guns.  It is what it means to be an American—FREE.

Gun control made last Friday’s horror possible, and all but one like it since 1950, and probably the next one.  Your gun could be the one to stop the next one.  Think about it.  Think about the lives you may be called to save, with deadly force.  You will be right before the Constitution, you will be right before your fellow citizens, and you will be right before God.

AND PRAY.

GOT TO GET THROUGH THIS

We want to just get past this tough time.
We pray for it to be over, for deliverance.
What does God promise about our trouble ?

“In the world you will have tribulation (that’s big trouble, long-term trouble) . . . “

“Man is born into trouble, as the sparks fly upward.”

“Many are the afflictions of the righteous . . .”

“Whoever the Lord loves He chastens (disciplines, corrects, severely) . . .”

“Call on Me in the day of trouble . . .”

“The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away . . .”

“Though He slay me . . .”

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me ?”
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Rarely can we see the whole picture like God sees it, in our time of trouble.
When God chooses to use a person mightily, He first tests him severely.
That statement holds true with the Bible verses above—and there are more.
And, there is more to these verses, as indicated by . . .

“In the world you will have tribulation (that’s big trouble, long-term trouble), but be of good cheer, for I have overcome the world.

“Man is born into trouble, as the sparks fly upward.” “Consider the end of Job.

“Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but the Lord delivers him out of them all.

“Whoever the Lord loves, He chastens (disciplines, corrects, severely), so God deals with you as sons.

“Call on Me in the day of trouble, I will deliver you, and you will glorify me.

“The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord.

“Though He slay me, yet I will trust in Him.

“My God, my God, why have you forsaken me ?”

Jesus suffered on the cross, forsaken by God, for our sake, the likes of which we’ll never know.
Accept what Jesus did for you, and trust His perspective to cover the tough times and the mysteries of this life.

“For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.”

“DETER, DELEGITIMATE, DESTROY”

“. . . the Biden administration’s default setting of mollifying and appeasing Xi Jinping. That only emboldens the Chinese Communist Party, when we should be doing everything possible to deter, delegitimate, and destroy it.”
—–Frank Gaffney
Secure Freedom Minute

NICE AND EASY – – – NOT !

“We are not called to be nice. We are often called to be confrontational.”
“Nice is not a fruit of the Spirit.”
—–Sandy Rios, afr.net

“Woe to them that are at ease in Zion.”
“Endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.”

A few years ago I realized that most of my prayers were asking God to make life easier.
“We must through much tribulation enter the kingdom of God.”

I will say to my soul, “You have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry.” But God said to him, “Fool! This night your soul will be required of you.”

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Christians suffering severely, many with martyrdom, around the world today—that is the norm through history for following Jesus—rather than the easy Christianity in America.
– – –
“You are the salt of the earth; you are the light of the world.”
I say again,
“It will become harder to be a Christian in America—but it will be easier to tell who is a Christian (because it will be harder, more real).”*
– – –
The question coming up now:
Will Americans who claim or assume Christianity make the transition from easy to costly, following Jesus.
That change is upon us.
A remnant, a minority, will be faithful—and God will be faithful to them through it all.
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*Read this:
2020—A CLEAR SPIRITUAL VISION
(AWordforThought.com)

IMPROVING ON MALE AND FEMALE ?

To be consistent in the frenzy to re-define male and female, re-arrange male and female parts, eliminate male and female – – – then lots of luck to the politically correct tsunami of words to re-label everything in the construction industries of plumbing and electrical – – – communication without saying ‘male’ and ‘female’ ? ? ?

My prediction—they’ll try—and they’ll be stopped dead in their tracks.
So much for business bowing down to all things lgbt.
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– – –
“lgbt is a bunch of non-reproductive, regressive mental mutations—applied evolution, attempted today—just the latest season in the series, ‘Did God really say?'”

Read EVOLUTION IS DE-VOLUTION at AWordforThought.com

PROMISES – – – EASTER PROMISES ! ! !

Jesus clearly said He would rise from death in three days.
Later, He even said, “I told you so.”
On the day He died, who believed Him ?
After He died, what did His followers do ?
Where did they go ? They hid behind locked doors.
After Jesus appeared to them, they were still hiding.
– – –
We have Jesus’ promise, and proof, of His resurrection.
And we have multitudes more promises of what He will do for us.
Do we know those promises ?
Do we believe them, or just know them ?
If we believe them, do we count on them, and act on them publicly ?
Do we accept danger and opposition and real trouble, real cost, real persecution ?
Of all the people we know, who knows that we carry the name of Jesus with us wherever we go ?
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– – –
After Jesus appeared to His disciples, they were still hiding . . .
UNTIL . . .

Until the Holy Spirit came after ten days of prayer after Jesus went back to heaven.
Then, all-heaven broke loose, and Peter preached, and the others preached in all the languages of the foreigners in Jerusalem celebrating the Jewish feast of Pentecost—and 3000 people became believers in Jesus.
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What about us, today ?
Same as day one.
UNTIL we pray and receive the Holy Spirit . . .

All-heaven can break loose in our lives at any time, and we can boldly tell everyone about Jesus who died in our place and rose back to life so we can too.
We start by making sure “all the people we know, know that we carry the name of Jesus with us wherever we go.”