Long Shot?--or the only One worth taking!

Greetings dearest beloved fellow earthlings!

Todays blog is to remind us of the importance of preparation for lifes major events.

Many of those reading this today will have had the experience of international travel. Those of us in this category, would be cognisant of the need to take great care, when preparing the documents of passage for such an undertaking.
We are all aware of the need to comply with visa and passport requirements when we travel to a foreign nation. Most reasonable people would not think it unusual or outrageous, to be asked at the port of entry to a different nation, to submit their passports and visas to the immigration officials for study and processing.

Most people in their right mind, would not dream of arriving at the entry point and telling the officials that they didnt need a passport or visa as they are a former eagle scout and they sponsor poor families in 3rd world countries. It would be equally foolish to try and smile widely with your new cosmetic dental work and try to dazzle the entry officials with stories of how well educated and friendly you are and what a great philanthropist you are. Even showing them your dental records, diplomas, bank statements and documents, validating your philanthropic exploits would be pointless to gain admittance.

The only documents that would carry any authority, would be a bona fide passport from your country of citizenship with the stamped visas inside. Most people realize how important these documents are and would not dream of leaving home on international trips without them. It would be extremely unwise to disregard these requirements. To do so would mean being almost instantly deported and then have to explain back in the country of origin why they should readmit you without your passport. It could result in being an international exile for a period of time and cost huge legal fees and fines etc.

It always amazes me that most people take more care in preparing for a trip to China, than they do to get ready for lifes ultimate expedition into the endlessness of eternity. Many people would say, well, no one knows what eternity is like, it is an unknown realm and no one is qualified to give preparation instructions for such a trip.

In most cases this is correct but there is one person named Jesus Christ who claimed to be God Almighty, who came from Heaven and was conceived by the Holy Ghost in the womb of Mary. He claimed to be all God and all man, he claimed to be sinlessly perfect and that this qualified Him to die and pay the the penalty of all mankinds sin. He went to the Cross and suffered the unspeakable ultimate suffering for the penalty of our sin. He stated that He came to give life and forgiveness in total overflowing abundance to all who call Him Lord and believe in His resurrection from death. Jesus even came back from death to validate His case, He is the only religious leader in History to claim this. Others were raised from death but still succumbed to natural death at a later date. Jesus never died again and is alive and well forevermore! Our faith and trust in Him is the passport to Heaven. Its simple but profoundly important because faith causes a Spiritual miracle in our heart or spirit to take place. (sse verse below)

2 Corinthians 5:21 For He hath made Him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him. (KJV)

John 3:16-17 King James Version (KJV)

16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

17 For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.

I remember hearing the story of Bill, a Christian minister and Bob, a non believing businessman, these men were old friends and had grown up together in school. They had gone separate ways after graduation and had not seen each other in 30 years. The businessman named Bob said to his old friend, "Bob, what are you going to do if you die and find out that you wasted your life because the Gospel story was just a myth or fairy tale?"

Bob said "Well Bill, even if it turned out that Christianity was a fairy tale, which Im certain its not, but even if it was, I would still have had a great life and it would be a wonderful fairy tale for me!" Then Bob said "Bill, what are you going to do when you die and find out that what Jesus said in the Bible was not a fairy tale but is absolutely the Truth?"

The reality is that the old Boy Scout motto "Be Prepared" is more pertinent in the case of eternity than any other. Even if there was only a 1 percent chance the Bible was true it would still be worth living a Christ centered life and being prepared, just in case. A home in a realm of Eternal Love is way too important to take chances on. As they say, it is better to be safe than sorry. The joy of knowing we will all live together in a Home of Endless Love with Love Himself and our earthly loved ones is better than all the Riches and thrills of earth combined.
So trusting Jesus is not a long shot, so no matter what, we cant lose by trusting Him!

PRIORITIES FOR LIFE MATTER!

More and More , we live in a world that has made a wholesale rejection of traditional values. Many believe we are in a new enlightened age of free thinking and free wheeling, and have embraced change of older and even ancient moral positions.

Today it is considered a foregone conclusion that we should do all within our power to prevent cruelty to animals and even take expensive and far reaching measures to protect the rights of animals. While it is an obvious humane and virtuous position to love and protect our animals and to ensure a good home for discarded pets, other areas once of paramount importance have been neglected and even wilfully interdicted by adversarial methods.
One issue that comes to mind in our culture that demonstrates a skewed priority is the lack of respect now for unborn human life in our western world.

I read recently that over 50 million Americans have been aborted since 1973.(I dont have figures for other Western nations but probably on a par) This is an extreme disregard for the sanctity and protection of the growing child in the mothers womb. The pregnant womb once signified the place of greatest safety and nurturing anywhere in our culture.

Wikipedia says: Total military dead in WW2: from 22 to 25 million, including deaths in captivity of about 5 million prisoners of war. Abortion has now killed in USA alone more people than twice the number of worldwide military personnel killed in WW2. If this is not a super mega holocaust /genocide , what is?

Nowadays, in our modern value system, it is considered quite normal to approve of and even encourage abortion on a massive wholesale level. It is even considered to be just a method of birth control for many. Another troubling issue is the widespread attitude that only out of touch people or whackos would oppose abortion. Also even more troubling is that some of these abortion methods are hugely barbaric and many times go wrong and result in a slow and terrible death to the babies. Particularly, the saline (salt) method to abort a baby has allowed many unborns to survive the salt attack and writhe in pain for hours outside the mothers body, accounts have been told by attending nurses of them lying and left to die in medical waste receptacles, denied the rights of emergency treatment and care that a born baby in distress would receive.It seems, only born babies have citizenship rights of emergency treatment for life threatening injuries.

For those readers who are only now reading for the first time of these sad accounts, you are probably denying that these situations ever occur in an enlightened age and nation. Sadly just like many other modern issues not covered here, it is hard to believe it could and does happen.

I wont go into the brutality of partial birth abortion procedure details, most will be familiar with that.
Many young pregnant women and girls are given counselling advice by "so called" experts who encourage and advocate abortion as the best solution to their inconvenient pregnancy. They assure them there will be no negative, physical, psychological or spiritual after effects of terminating the baby.

The huge numbers of women who now attest they would never have taken that road if they had known the tragic fallout
of guilt, sorrow and mental/emotional pain is often not even discussed and mentioned to new girls receiving rosy assurances to go ahead and abort.

Another reason not to abort is that huge numbers of childless couples are longing for the chance to adopt a baby and provide a wonderful loving home and family. Another reason is that our population is rapidly aging and we need new children to be future leaders, providers and workers in our culture. The number of retired on social Security cannot be sustained by the shrinking younger workforce.
The main reason is to obey the Lord and let Him decide who lives and dies.
I didnt expect to write on this subject today but it just came out of me as I started typing, so here it is.

PS: The great news for the one out of three Moms and Dads who had or endorsed abortions is that God is a forgiving and healing Father of Love and Mercy. There is no need to go through life beating yourself up about past bad decisons and not forgiving yourself. The minute you ask God to forgive you and make genuine decisions to change and make good decisons in future, He instantly forgives and gives Power to live a New Life with His Strength, Peace and Comfort for a broken heart.

We are all sinners (sin is an old archery term meaning to miss the mark) and we have blown it one way or another. We have all failed miserably at times, even if we are strong Christians. The Bible defines all hatred against ones fellow man as murder and all lustful longing for anyone who is not our spouse as adultery, even if we dont actually carry it out in the physical realm. This shows that we have all failed in these areas, so we cant look down our noses at someone who has "blown it" with bad choices, we all have done that.

see the words of John the Apostle of Love below
2 My dear children, I am writing this to you so that you will not sin. But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous. 2 He himself is the sacrifice that atones for our sins—and not only our sins but the sins of all the world.

DEATH ABOLISHED FOREVERMORE!

2 Timothy 1:10
King James Version (KJV)10 But is now made manifest by the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, and hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel

The above verse says Jesus has abolished death. If medical research or a pharmaceutical firm found a pill to abolish death it would be the biggest breakthrough in world history and trillions would be made, if it was ever made available. Well, guess what folks, Jesus has already done it--the pill is called the Gos-pill, get it? (not a literal pill--just a joke) It is a substance though, called Faith!

Hebrews 11:1 KJV
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

All we have to do in order to never die is believe, If you want to fly to London just step into the provided airliner. It would be very silly to try and buy a pair of wings to cross the Atlantic, that wouldn’t work! Jesus did all the excruciating, agonizing and humanly impossible work at the Cross, so we can have Eternal Life with Him in Heaven. (Way better than anything on earth)

John 3:15 that whosoever believeth may in him have eternal life.


Of course we are not discussing physical death here, that will happen to all of us eventually. (Except for those believers who are alive when Jesus returns at the second coming)
Death, eternal spiritual death, in its ultimate form, has been legally abolished and destroyed. Religion cannot destroy death, only Absolute Life can destroy death.
Life Himself defeated it eternally on its own turf then rose again after confiscating the keys of hell and death off satan.

Revelation 1:18 KJV
I am He that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen;and have the keys of hell and of death.

The Good News is that not only will we live with him in our spiritual form, but we will eventually get a brand new body just like the one Jesus had after the Resurrection.

John 11:25-26 (Message)
“You don’t have to wait for the End. I am, right now, Resurrection and Life. The one who believes in me, even though he or she dies, will live. And everyone who lives believing in me does not ultimately die at all. Do you believe this?”

The sad part is that we have an enemy who does his best to blind our eyes and hearts to the awesome, stupendous, magnanimous deal that God has purchased for us and He is freely offering to all who will receive it.


How would you react, if an eccentric looking homeless man handed you a million dollar cheque, (or check) written on a tattered old faded and stained check form. Maybe we would be very suspicious of its veracity and neglect to bank it or cash it. If so and the check just happened to be legitimate, we would miss out on the money.
Well many forget to bank the Gospel in their hearts by believing in the risen Jesus.
So like the man who doubted the old stained check, all they perceive the prescription for defeating death to be, is an old outdated religious sects superstition written in an old beat up Bible.
Even worse a million dollars is absolute garbage, compared to Eternal Life in Gods Heaven of Love. It’s not about how good or bad we think we are, its how good God is and how much he loves to provide Eternal Passage to Heaven. When we call Him Lord Jesus and believe He rose from the dead, well, that’s how we step on board with Him Forever.

GALATIANS 2:19-21 MESSAGE What actually took place is this: I tried keeping rules and working my head off to please God, and it didn’t work. So I quit being a “law man” so that I could be God’sman. Christ’s life showed me how, and enabled me to do it. I identified myself completely with him. Indeed, I have been crucified with Christ. My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me. The life you see me living is not “mine,” but it is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I am not going to go back on that.
Is it not clear to you that to go back to that old rule-keeping, peer-pleasing religion would be an abandonment of everything personal and free in my relationship with God? I refuse to do that, to repudiate God’s grace. If a living relationship with God could come by rule-keeping, then Christ died unnecessarily.---WORDS OF PAUL OF TARSUS IN TODAYS ENGLISH


Romans 10:11-13 (MSG)
11-13 it’s exactly the same no matter what a person’s religious background may be: the same God for all of us, acting the same incredibly generous way to everyone who calls out for help. “Everyone who calls, ‘Help, God!’ gets help.”

Isaiah 1:18 (NKJV) | In Context | Whole Chapter
18 “Come now, and let us reason together,”
Says the LORD,
“Though your sins are like scarlet,
They shall be as white as snow;
Though they are red like crimson,
They shall be as wool.

POST CHRISTIAN WORLD?

POST CHRISTIAN WORLD?
We live today in a post Christian society. The Judeo Christian morality has by and large vanished from our western culture. (apart from within some churches and Christian community subcultures).
I was listening to a well known Christian author on the radio a while back, who stated “The Culture war is over and the Christian world has lost” What a statement that was.
In the temporal and transient world we live in this is correct. In the Eternal, immutable Spiritual realm of God and His Word it is still incorrect.
It has been said that God and His Word are One! The New Testament affirms this

John 1
Amplified Bible (AMP)
1 In the beginning [before all time] was the Word ([a]Christ), and the Word was with God, and the Word was God [b]Himself.
2 He was present originally with God.
3 All things were made and came into existence through Him; and without Him was not even one thing made that has come into being.
4 In Him was Life, and the Life was the Light of men.
5 And the Light shines on in the darkness, for the darkness has never overpowered it [put it out or absorbed it or appropriated it, and is unreceptive to it].

When I was a new Christian believer in the mid 1970s I wondered why God had such placed strict regulations on human sexual practices as outlined in the New Testament. The Holy Spirit impressed upon me, that it was not because God wanted to limit our fun party life together. He said within my heart that sex is not just for exhilaration and refreshment but that it is a true Blood Covenant intended between a man and woman to create deep commitment and family ties for the resulting children of the union. God also showed me that sex is a huge powerhouse of energy that is like electricity or nuclear power. The more powerful the energy the more strict the regulations must be to prevent destructive abuses taking place. Fires must be built in a fireplace in a house and nukes must be contained within a reactor in order to harness the energy and make it productive. Unregulated and promiscuous use of great power causes destruction and heartbreak. Sexual energy is no exception, this is why God ordained marriage so that the resulting power release will create warmth and joy and not cause destructive meltdowns, as it were.

Today, many believe that the Bible is an outmoded garble of ancient philosophy that is not relevant for today. Many believe that there is a new morality and measurement to gauge our conduct that is far superior to the Bible.
One man said that the new morality is just the old immorality dressed up.
Anyway, pray, talk to God and ask Him to open your eyes to bring enlightenment when you read the Word. His Word is Spirit and Life.

WORDS FROM JESUS-------JOHN 6:63 It is the Spirit Who gives life [He is the Life-giver]; the flesh conveys no benefit whatever [there is no profit in it]. The words (truths) that I have been speaking to you are spirit and life (Amplified Bible)





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