PRAYER IS POWERFUL

Please lift up an anonymous prayer request for church families who are really struggling with a lot of private and financial issues right now. The pressures of “life” are putting a real strain on their marriages and there is talk of giving up and walking away from these long standing marriages. It seems to be a repeated theme in our recent prayer requests, and it is definitely an obvious attack from our adversary to discredit and destroy the institution of Godly marriages.
So let’s pray for ALL our church families and their marriages, that God would protect their bond of marriage, and would strengthen it during these challenging times. Finances really put a strain on relationships, and many couples now are fearfully faced with losing their current situations, so lets respond to this by praying for God to intervene and stop these waves that often strike at the base of our relationships. It is like these assaults are like crashing waves in a storm and our marriage couples are in tiny boats on the sea trying to weather out each hit from the stormy angry sea, and yet God is calling us to keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, the Author and FINISHER of our faith. Let’s pray for God to seal tightly our marriages, to “water seal” them from the assaults of the enemy, that God would hold them in the palm of His hand during these uncertain times, and that our married couples would cling to one another as well as the cross at the core of their relationship. Pray for God to be glorified in the midst of these trials.
I also encourage you to be supportive of one another, and for those struggling. Please do not isolate yourself. The enemy would want to get you off by yourself and beat you up even more about how hopeless things appear. Instead… reach out to your Christian brothers and sisters so we can be here to support you and help in any way we can. That’s what the Body of Christ here on earth is called to do!

Know when to speak #3

What does one have to do to receive this gift? We’ve learned that eternal life is a gift from God. Romans 6:23 and Ephesians 2:8-9 back this up completely.

As we take a look at ‘man’, we see how the verses in Ephesians play an important part. We find in Romans 3:23, “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” Man is a sinner. That would be everyone except Jesus. At this point there will be those who say they don’t sin very much, and they will let their good deeds weigh against the bad they have done in their life. As you point out that all mankind is a sinner you may run into the objection from some that they don’t believe all that is contained in the Bible. They say the Bible was written by man. Well, guess what! The Bible was written by man, inspired by God
To be more precise, the Bible was written by some forty different people comprising sixty six books, and written over a period of fifteen hundred years. At this point I usually ask the person to imagine that they are God. Would they let the Bible be in error if it was their way to communicate the plan of salvation??

Now we’ll get back to the person who says they don’t sin very much. This would be a good time to define the word sin. Ask the person you are talking to what sin means to them. You’ll receive a number of answers, all of which are probably correct. After about three or four ideas come forth, just mention that sin can easily be defined as something displeasing to God. That would be anything done in thought or deed. With that, let’s look at an example how this works.

A good person probably sins ten times a day. For this example we’ll say the person only sins three times a day. Pardon the expression…that’s just about walking on water. Three times 365 days per year; that’s over 1000 sins. Now multiply that by about 70 years. Wow! Over 70,000 sins. Where do you think you would end up in a court of law with 70,000 counts against you?

As these numbers sink in, explain that God has a passing grade into heaven. Matthew 5:48 says it pretty clearly; “Be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect.” Sounds like 100 percent to me.

Still there are those who think they can hide their ‘little’ sins. Let’s take a look at another example. You are making an omelet. As you are cracking the eggs and putting them in a bowl, you realize you have cracked one that doesn’t look real good. You figure, ‘what the heck’, and finish putting about six eggs in the mixing bowl. You figure, ‘no one will know’. But, you know…The same is with God. You may try to hide the little sins, but God knows.

Can you see why man can not save himself? Next month we’ll see what God has to say about man, and how He deals with the issue of sin.
…Editor

A Little Humor (But a whole lot of truth…)

HEAVEN'S ENTRANCE EXAM

A man dies and goes to Heaven. Saint Peter meets him at the Pearly Gates and says,
"Ok, here's how it works. You need 100 points to make it into Heaven. You tell me all the good things you've done, and I'll award you a certain number of points for each item, depending on how good it was. When you reach 100 points, you get in."
"Okay," the man says...."I was married to the same woman for 50 years and never once cheated on her, even in my heart."
"That's wonderful," says Saint Peter, "That's worth three points!"
"Three points?" he asks.
"Well, I attended church all my life and supported its ministry with my tithes and service."
"Terrific!" says Saint Peter, "That's certainly worth a point."
"One point”?!!
Hey, I started a soup kitchen in my city and worked in a shelter for homeless veterans!"
"Fantastic, that's good for two more points, " Saint Peter says.
"Two points?!!" the man cries.
"At this rate, the only way I'm going to get into Heaven is by the Grace of God!"
"Bingo, 100 points! Come on in!"

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