Our pastor Bro Dennis is beginning a men’s study on leadership. Men, if you are a member of Midway Baptist Church or live in the Florida Panhandle, please consider this an invitation to join us on Monday evenings from 6:00 – 7:30 (Bible Study begins at 6:30).
I am so looking forward to this teaching.
Is there anything more frustrating for a Christian than someone you have witnessed to who believes in Christ but will not confess Him because of how it may be received by others? That frustration is not a rare emotion; in fact a couple of days before Christ was crucified, He experienced that same frustration:
Last night I presented this question to my social media followers and blog email list:
We have many enemies in this world. Our greatest enemy, for those without Christ, is death. Death is the enemy of God. God created life; Satan created death, despair, and disease. Suffering is the antithesis to creation. As you read the creation story in Genesis 1 you see death, despair, and disease were not a part of the original plan. In fact when God finished, the Bible tells us:
In his second epistle, the Apostle Peter gives us seven steps to spiritual growth.
I wanted to share an encouraging note I received from one of my devotional readers; she is somewhat new to our group (now numbering 212). Tara wrote in response to my taking a devotional hiatus, and I publish this somewhat unwillingly because I do not want to draw attention to myself, but I felt a strong urging from the Lord to share this with you.
This dear sister-in-Christ so clearly addresses what we all struggle with; how to best serve the Lord. Here is her response:
Beloved,
I will be taking a two-week hiatus from writing devotionals as I work on another project. I’ll give you a hint of what it is; it is a sequel to my book Understanding Evangelicals: A Guide To Jesusland. If you don’t have a copy of the first one, you get one in paperback or Kindle at Amazon.
So once again we are watching the circus live and in color on our television sets. The stage? Congress and the White House and the looming fiscal cliff. It is amazing to see after what was called the most important election of our lifetime that nothing has changed in Washington D.C. All the old leaders are the new leaders and you could not fill a bus up with those serving who are righteous in the sight of God. It reminds me of the old Rolling Stones song “We Won’t Get Fooled Again” where it ends with “Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.”
I was asked by some, and accused by others, if I was looking for perfection in a candidate. My answer to both is I am looking for righteousness in our public servants. Those, whether or not they are Christians, who have a sense of responsibility to their electorate and more important to “the laws of nature and nature’s God.” As my buddy Steve Deace always says, “We want people of convictions, not positions.”
To hope and trust in God means doing so in His power and providence; not in our might and motives. Again, this may seem as a simple truth, and it is, but always remember that simple rarely equates to easy. We are hard-wired to do things on our own. But when we are placing our hope and trusting in the Lord Jesus Christ, we can see with eternal eyes and know that God is in control.
We just finished preparing our annual church budget to present to the church. This is not a budget that looks at the economic uncertainty in our nation. It is not a budget that considers that perhaps people will be strapped for money and giving will inevitably be down.
When I was a young boy and even in my teenage years growing up in Northern California near the Pacific Ocean, one of my favorite things to do when we went to Bodega Bay was to go out on the jetty at Doran Beach and climb and walk the big rocks all the way to the end. We would even fish from there. However, it was very dangerous and at times extremely slippery on those massive, jagged rocks. If you were not careful you could slip and hurt yourself real good.
As we go through this Christian life, keeping in mind the encouraging words of Christ to be of good cheer, we must be certain we know what that means. We’ve said it means to take courage, but often that is easier said than done. I would submit that we usually are fearful before we are courageous.
So many Christian patriots are very discouraged by the election outcome. Many are ready to quit; many are ready to start a third party; many are just ready “to go home” (I can sympathize with the latter sentiment). Discouragement is one of Satan’s greatest weapons against God’s people. It can be lethal. He may use persecution, predicaments, or privation to bring us to our knees and shout, “I give up!” Satan loves defeated Christians because misery loves company.
Beloved, we are not defeated! Our foe has been vanquished and we already have the victory.
Glory to God, for He is on His throne! Jesus is King, Lord, and Savior to all who call to Him for salvation. America is today still the greatest nation in history and I praise God for being born an American. No matter the outcome of our elections throughout history, the peaceful transition of power is a God-breathed miracle captured by godly men who founded our nation. They were God-fearing men who recognized and relied upon the Providence of God.
Our nation is truly at a crossroads. The political outcome of yesterday’s election is a reflection…a symptom…of what ails our great country. Over half of our country clearly has an entitlement mentality where they believe by merely being Americans who may or may not have been dealt a bad hand that they are entitled to other people’s money. Beloved, that is a clear indication of a deeper issue that must be addressed.
Tomorrow is election day. I’ve made my predictions as have many others. Some say Mitt Romney is going to win in a landslide (as I believe) and others are calling for a narrow victory for Barack Obama. Regardless the outcome, what will Christians do on Wednesday morning to whatever lies ahead? Will we throw our hands up in the air and give up because Obama was re-elected, or will we go back to our workaday lives no longer vigilant over government because Romney won?
The American Church needs to answer three questions and it is not I who has come up with them. The great theologian A.W. Pink in his book “The Sovereignty of God” asks the following:
I received a response from a dear sister-in-Christ to the comments the past two emails I sent out on whether or not we can vote for the lesser of two evils. Understand that this is no simple matter, voting that is. I am glad to see so many Christians thinking through all of this by questioning and searching the scriptures for answers. That is what we are called to do. In fact, I presented some questions to my pastor and interviewed him Monday night to get his perspective. Bro Dennis is the one man I trust most in this world and while I may not always agree with him, I know I will get a straight answer from him. So is the case with so many other men who bless my life. There are a few women who fit that category also. You can hear Part 1 of Bro Dennis interview at my other blog: http://www.aletheiagroup.org/?p=1088
Here are the words of one sister-in-Christ and her thought process in this election season, admittedly by her incomplete words but I believe they warrant sharing:
Alan Keyes
I struggled with writing yesterday’s devotional because I knew I was missing the mark on what I was trying to explain. Alan responded to my devotional and has wonderfully written of what I was only beginning to figure out. Without understanding it, it was the imperfection of which Alan writes that I was trying to allude. Alan has given me permission to publish his response.
Apparently the debate went real well for Mitt Romney from what I’m seeing in my email box and on social media. Many voters are lamenting the fact that we once again are stuck with voting for “the lesser of two evils.” I used to have the same lament but then I wondered if there were any other possibilities. Is there a such thing as a man or a woman who is not evil, biblically speaking that is? Is that “perfect” candidate or “good” candidate available? Can we judge a man by his words only or does his record count? What if he doesn’t have a record of public service? How do we judge him then? Just by his words? I have found in my 55 years on earth that it is far easier to say you will do right then to actually do it when faced with the situation.
So is there such a thing as a man not being evil, because if we are not to vote for the lesser of two evils or to never chose evil, what are our options when it comes to man? Is there even someone we can look at and call righteous?
That’s the topic of this week’s The Truth Newsletter. It seems that we can not only break God’s 6th Commandment, “You shall not murder,” but we can also disobey God’s 8th Commandment, “You shall not steal.” You can do these things if America’s survival is at stake. At least that is what I am being told by Christians and a Tea Party Leader.
I obviously have a very strong opinion about this that most of you could probably state verbatim. However, my opinion in and of itself means nothing if it is not grounded in Biblical truth. God’s 2nd Commandment is the second longest of the ten and I think it is most overlooked by American Christians. I know for me it is the commandment hardest for me to keep because I allow so many things in this world to become an idol. Here’s what God wrote:
If we are to be Christlike then my simple mind tells me we are supposed to be like Christ. I’m not making a play on words, but sadly it is becoming more customary in the Church is to throw Christian clichés around like some sort of holy Frisbee. It can be a lot of fun but you don’t really get a lot of exercise from it. When the Apostle John introduced our Lord to us in his Gospel, we get a complete definition of who Christ is:
Should we prepare for the future? Absolutely! Should we try to predict the future? Only if you’re a fool. We can no more predict the future than we can determine our future. We can most certainly effect our future, but we are not in control of it. This may seem obvious to all of you, however if you read or listen to the news each day you would think some of these “experts” each had their own special crystal ball. Many would consider King Solomon the smartest man to ever live and he was wise enough to know we cannot know what the future holds:
Random House Dictionary defines providence as “the foreseeing care and guidance of God or nature over the creatures of the earth.” Of course we who believe the Bible to be inerrant and infallible would submit nature under God. After all, did not Jesus calm the stormy sea?
The Bible does not use the actual word providence; instead it teaches the doctrine of providence. The Evangelical Dictionary of Theology explains there are three aspects of God’s providence.
