God owes us nothing but...

A young lady from Corona, California, was devastated by the tragic death of her boyfriend. The couple had just celebrated the birth of their first child. He had been to a nightclub, and was returning with friends at 2:00 a.m., when police believe he was speeding and lost control. He wrapped his car around a tree, killing himself and his three passengers.

His mother said that her son “loved to drink.” His distraught girlfriend lamented, “I don’t know why God would do this to me.”

My heart went out to her for her loss, but why was she blaming God for the death of her boyfriend? He was the one who was speeding, probably drunk, at 2:00 a.m. He killed himself. The incident had nothing to do with God, other than that He allowed it, in His sovereign will.

It seems obvious that many nowadays think God is nothing but a divine butler. He is there for our convenience—to come running when we snap our sinful fingers.

God gave us life. He lavished His goodness upon us, and to think that we can treat Him as some sort of lowly servant reveals a great ignorance of who He is. Such error can only end in disillusionment of life and bitterness of soul.

God owes us nothing but justice. He has no obligation at all to bless us with health, wealth, or long life. A civil judge is under no obligation to show mercy to a guilty criminal. If there was an obligation, then it wouldn’t be true mercy. Mercy is unmerited. He is, however, obligated to make sure that justice is done.

So it is with God. He is obligated by His very nature to manifest His divine and just wrath against all sin, and that will happen on what the Bible calls “the great and terrible day of the Lord” (the Day of Judgment). But He is also “rich in mercy,” and has offered us mercy in the cross...and we must receive it while we are on this side of eternity.

Proverbs 3:29 Who has woe?
Who has sorrow?
Who has contentions?
Who has complaints?
Who has wounds without cause?
Who has redness of eyes?
30 Those who linger long at the wine,
Those who go in search of mixed wine.

May Compassion Ruler our Hearts

“The more we become what we shall be, the more will compassion rule our hearts. The Lord Jesus Christ, who is the pattern and mirror of perfect manhood, what said He concerning the sins and the woes of Jerusalem? He knew Jerusalem must perish; did He bury his pity beneath the fact of the divine decree, and steel His heart by the thought of the sovereignty or the justice that would be resplendent in the city’s destruction? No, not He, but with eyes gushing like founts, he cried, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings! and you would not.” If you would be like Jesus, you must be tender and very pitiful…I beseech you, let your hearts be moved with pity, do not endure to see the spiritual death of mankind. Be in agony as often as you contemplate the ruin of any soul of the seed of Adam.” Charles Spurgeon 

Luke 13:34 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her brood under herwings, but you were not willing! 

No one can "kill" a Christian

Actually, no one can “kill” a Christian. It’s been well-said that death isn’t the termination of existence, but the entrance into an eternal and unchanging state. The Christian has been “sealed” with the life of God Himself. All a murderer does is promote those who trust in Christ from this pain-filled futile existence into eternal reality. Then, in the coming kingdom, we will enjoy forever an earth where “the wolf and the lamb shall feed together, the lion shall eat straw like the ox” (Isa. 65:25).

“You can kill us, but you cannot do us any real harm.” Justin Martyr (martyred A.D. 165)

Acts 7:59 And they stoned Stephen as he was calling on God and saying, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.”

Peace and Joy

“Understand that you must not look upon the possession of joy and peace as being the absolutely necessary consequence of your being saved. A man may be in the lifeboat, but that lifeboat may be so tossed about that he may still feel himself exceedingly ill, and think himself to be still in peril. It is not his sense of safety that makes him safe; he is safe because he is in the lifeboat, whether he is sensible of this or not. Understand then that joy and peace are not infallible or indispensable evidences of safety, and that they certainly are not unchanging evidences. The brightest Christians lose their joy, and some of those that stand well in the things of God, and concerning whom you would entertain no doubt, entertain a great many suspicions, however, about themselves. Joy and peace are the element of a Christian, but he is sometimes out of his element: joy and peace are his usual states, but there are times when, with fightings within and wars without, his joy departs, and his peace is broken. The leaves on the tree prove that the tree is alive, but the absence of leaves will not prove that the tree is dead.” Charles Spurgeon 

Romans 15:13 Now may the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that you may abound in hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Almighty God spoke it...

Make sure you don’t miss the magnitude of what God accomplished in creating the sun. Its surface temperature is about 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit, with the temperature at the core around 27 million degrees Fahrenheit. That’s hot. The sun’s diameter is about 870,000 miles (109 times greater than Earth), and it is 333,000 times heavier—and that is only one of over 100 billion stars that God made. It burns an incredible seven million tons of natural gas every second.

And Almighty God spoke it into existence.

Genesis 1:16 Then God made two great lights: the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night.He made the stars also.

They hate God's Law.

The disobedient and rebellious hate God’s Law. They think that their moral dilemma will be solved and they can sin with guilt-free abandonment if they expel the Ten Commandments and those who preach God’s Law. However, God wrote His Law in stone with His own finger, and He engraved its work on the tablets of their heart (see Rom. 2:15). They will still have to face Him and His Law on the Day of Wrath.

Nehemiah 9:26 “Nevertheless they were disobedient
And rebelled against You,
Cast Your law behind their backs
And killed Your prophets, who testified against them
To turn them to Yourself;
And they worked great provocations.

As bad or as good as it gets

For believers, life here on earth is as bad it gets; for those who refuse Jesus as their Savior, life here on earth is as good as it gets.

“Has this world been so kind to you that you should leave with regret? There are better things ahead than any we leave behind.” C. S. Lewis 

Matthew 25:46 And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

Don't Hide Christ

This is a busy time of year. Yet we should never be so busy that the wonder of Jesus becomes ordinary to us. Ask God to overwhelm you with the glorious deeds of Jesus Christ.

His birth was just the beginning of his time on earth. He is also creator of the Universe, and the fearsome rider on the white horse. He rules in and over time and stands outside of time. He turns darkness into the light that illuminates the new heavens and earth. He wields the sword which executes his Father’s will and pierces deeply into my heart. He strikes terror for those who will not yield. And he lovingly, compassionately, compellingly calls me home.

Praise his name!

From the Gospel of John

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.”

Ben Stein's confession

Apparently the White House referred to Christmas Trees as Holiday Trees for the first time this year, which prompted CBS presenter, Ben Stein, to present this piece which I would like to share with you.

The following was written by Ben Ste...in and recited by him on CBS Sunday Morning Commentary.

My confession:
I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejewelled trees, Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against. That's what they are, Christmas trees.

It doesn't bother me a bit when people say, 'Merry Christmas' to me. I don't think they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy time of year. It doesn't bother me at all that there is a manger scene on display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu. If people want a nativity scene, it's just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away.

I don't like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don't think Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no idea where the concept came from, that America is an explicitly atheist country. I can't find it in the Constitution and I don't like it being shoved down my throat.

Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that we should worship celebrities and we aren't allowed to worship God? I guess that's a sign that I'm getting old, too. But there are a lot of us who are wondering where these celebrities came from and where the America we knew went to.

In light of the many jokes we send to one another for a laugh, this is a little different: This is not intended to be a joke; it's not funny, it's intended to get you thinking.

Billy Graham's daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane Clayson asked her 'How could God let something like this happen?' (regarding Hurricane Katrina). Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response. She said, 'I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years we've been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government and to get out of our lives.And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His protection if we demand He leave us alone?'

In light of recent events... terrorist attacks, school shootings, etc. I think it started when Madeleine Murray O'Hare (she was murdered, her body found a few years ago) complained she didn't want prayer in our schools, and we said OK. Then someone said you better not read the Bible in school. The Bible says thou shalt not kill; thou shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK.

Then Dr. Benjamin Spock said we shouldn't spank our children when they misbehave, because their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem (Dr. Spock's son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he's talking about. And we said okay.

Now we're asking ourselves why our children have no conscience, why they don't know right from wrong, and why it doesn't bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves.

Probably, if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has a great deal to do with 'WE REAP WHAT WE SOW.'

Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder why the world's going to hell.
Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but question what the Bible says. 

Funny how you can send 'jokes' through e-mail and they spread like wildfire, but when you start sending messages regarding the Lord, people think twice about sharing. 

Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is suppressed in the school and workplace.

Are you laughing yet?

Funny how when you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list because you're not sure what they believe, or what they will think of you for sending it.

Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of us than what God thinks of us.

Pass it on if you think it has merit.

If not, then just discard it.... no one will know you did. But, if you discard this thought process, don't sit back and complain about what a bad shape the world is in.

My Best Regards, Honestly and respectfully,

Ben Stein

'Knowledge' in Gen. 3:5

Some skeptics see the word “knowledge” in Gen. 3:5 and conclude that God wants to prohibit man from having knowledge. They claim God likes people to be ignorant and unthinking, but they fail to consider what it is a knowledge of. But their sin brought evil into the world, and once mankind knew both good and evil, he had to choose between the two.

Before sin was in the world, Adam and Eve knew, and experienced, only good; in fact, God’s entire creation was “very good.” These same skeptics often complain about the evil they see in the world and blame it on God—yet it was because of Adam and Eve's desire to know good and evil that we now know and experience evil.

Genesis 3:5 For God knows that in the day you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.