Month: August 2016

Damaging Thoughts

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    Today I had damaging thoughts. Thoughts that damage the body and soul. I was praying as I was driving. I do a lot of driving and I have found it an excellent time to talk to God. Today, as I was praying my mind, began to wander. This is a problem that I battle with at times. I even wrote a blog back in July about how God is omnipresence. He is everywhere. We are not praying to a God that is far away. God is with us as we are praying. We should be talking to God as if He is right next to us, which He is.

    I have found that when I am driving and praying, if I visualize that Christ is sitting in the passenger seat, listening to me. My prayer seems more real and meaningful. I know He is with me at all times.

    Today I wasn’t doing that. I was tired and just going through the motions. My mind began to wander.

    I found myself thinking about a couple, whose home I had worked on. They had taken advantage of me. I found out too late, that they are the kind of people that go through life getting everything they can, for nothing. I was thinking of what I should have done and said differently. I had gone from talking to God, to have unkind thoughts about someone, without even realizing it. When I realized what I was doing, I immediately asked God’s forgiveness.

    We all have been wronged by others. It is just part of life. The problem comes when we dwell on those wrongs. Nothing good can come from it. Such thoughts lead to resentment, anger, bitterness and more. Many times these thoughts are directed at ourselves as well for letting it happen. Thoughts such as these are damaging to ourselves. They are not good for our physical or mental well-being.

   More important such thoughts push us away from God. The ONLY healthy option for our physical, emotional and spiritual health, is to forgive those who have wronged us and move on. God said, “ Vengeance is Mine, I will repay” (Romans 12:19). Jesus said we are to forgive others, (Matthew 6:15).  God wants us to forgive those who harm us, not get revenge. God did not tell us these things because He is concerned about those who do evil. Rather, He knows the damage such thinking does to ourselves. He loves us and wants what is best for us.

    I have found the best way for me to forgive someone, is to pray for them. Today I prayed for that couple. God forgive me for having those self-damaging thoughts.  

Who is Jesus?

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    As believers in Christ, we know that Jesus lived, was crucified, rose again, and is ALIVE Today. However, for the unbeliever, or those that have doubts, there is an enormous amount of proof documenting the life of Christ.

    The Bible contains over 300 fulfilled prophecies concerning the life of Jesus. Mathematician professor Peter Stoner and his class determined that for someone to fulfill 48 of these prophecies, would be 1 in 13 trillion. In other words, totally impossible, if He was not the Son Of God.

    The life of Jesus can actually be reconstructed apart from the Bible by all the writings, sermons and commentaries by early church fathers and writers. Material that is so old that it actually predates the gospels themselves.

    There are also many secular writers and historians from the time of Christ that documented His life as well. Such as Josephus, a well-known Roman 1st-century political historian. While not a follower of Jesus himself, he wrote a lengthy section about Jesus.

    One passage reads:

“Now about this time there lived Jesus, a wise man if indeed one ought to call him a man. For he was one who wrought surprising feats and was a teacher of such as accept the truth gladly, He won over many Jews and many of the Greeks. He was the Christ. When Pilate, upon hearing him accused by men of the highest standing condemned him to be crucified, those who had in the first place come to love him did not give up their affection for him. On the third day, he appeared to them restored to life, for the prophets of God had prophesied these and countless other marvelous things about him. And the tribe of Christians, so called after him, has still to this day not disappeared”.

 

A small sample of the proof that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of God. Taken from my book, “Things You Probably Didn’t Learn in Church”