September 2010 Truth Nuggets

• More people will be influenced for Christ by a life living example than could ever be influenced by a mouth searing argument!

• Some people doing bad deeds realize the folly of it and repent and turn to Christ only to now amass a heap of good works to acquire God’s favor and acceptance. Although doing good works vs bad works is commendable they are still an affront to the GRACE of God. They are as filthy rags in His sight! God accepts you only on the merits of GRACE through the sacrifice of Jesus. Through relationship with Him, accept His GRACE and His GRACE alone, from that will flow good works!
  

• Are you a PREYING person or a PRAYING person? A preying person capitalizes on the vulnerability of another person to injure and maim them by gossip and slander. A praying person is one who brings people’s vulnerabilities to God in prayer and covers the person with love and forgiveness. So which are you a PREYER or a PRAYER!

• Along this journey of life we need to set our course and compass for the Port of Hope, where we will find Peaceful Waters. There are many coves along the course that we sometimes dock in that prevents us from enjoying Peaceful Waters along the journey. Avoid docking in the cove of frustration, disappointment, pride, jealousy, pity and the cove of anger because it only agitates the Peaceful Waters that could be ours as we sail to the Port of Hope.

• Ensure that the things you deem important are important...ask yourself the question, how important will the thing I deem to be important today be in one year from now? It is important to make your decisions based on thoughtfulness and kindness towards others.

• Graceful believers do not demean or condemn people, recognizing that if it were not for His grace they would be condemned. Therefore if you condemn you are not a graceful believer even if you are the preacher who preaches grace!

• Life is but a journey, but ironic enough, the end of the journey is not the end of life. At the end of the journey is a door that we must all pass through that takes us from the physical realm to the spiritual realm where life has no end! Trusting in Jesus along the journey of life assures you entrance into the spiritual realm where the quality of life is good beyond measure.

• A true friend is someone you can confide in knowing they will not break that confidence, someone you can open your heart to knowing they will not break it, someone you can relax with when you have everything to be uptight about, someone who will laugh with you and not laugh at you, some one who will cry with you and not condemn you, someone you can share your innermost thoughts with and still support you.
  
  
• If you TRULY LOVE you will LOVE TRULY! There is no way to measure TRUE LOVE because it is a limitless LOVE that has no height, depth, length or width, in fact it is all encompassing. If you TRULY LOVE you will TRULY CARE and you will CARE DEEPLY!

• For to many people, their knowledge of Jesus is based on hearsay....What they have heard their pastor or others say. They believe that Jesus is the one to help them find what they are looking for, ignorant to the fact that Jesus alone is all they need. Jesus plus nothing equals GRACE! His GRACE is SUFFICIENT for your every need!
  
  
  
• There is no doubt about it, sometimes on the sea of life we experience shipwrecks, but don't forget that the journey of life is the lifeboat, singing in the lifeboat assures us that the shipwrecks will not take us under!

• Manipulation of the population is not an obligation for salvation nor is it a stipulation of sanctification, even if the manipulation is to get people’s cooperation to give due to religious stipulations. Instead it is conformation of degradation and a separation from the association of relationship with God and with people!

• Most people in religion (a group with particular set of beliefs) have enough religion to keep them from real faith, they seem to have an immunity to Jesus! The hardest people to reach are those who have grown up in church, spiritual cliches are their lingo, they quote the scriptures, yet they are inoculated against a personal relationship with God through Jesus.

• Some people have propagated a lie for so long they are deceived into believing the lie is truth and have lost their capacity for the TRUTH and when they are confronted with TRUTH they refuse the TRUTH and still believe that the lie they propagated as truth is TRUTH! So, so sad...“But Lord we did this in your Name and that in your Name,” only to hear the words, “Depart from me I never knew you”

• Characteristics of man ordained leaders
  
  They take a pragmatic approach that caters to what will give immediate results even at the cost of principles and integrity.
  They reason with sense knowledge and human reasoning rather than revelation knowledge.
  They walk by sight rather than by faith.
  They operate in the flesh rather than in the Spirit.
  They are more concerned about building self-image rather than being transformed into Jesus’ image.
  They are marked by a spirit of religious deception that comes out of a lying spirit rather than a spirit of discernment that comes from the spirit of truth.
  They are blame-shifters, unable to accept the truth against themselves they look for scapegoats, a fall person.
  They are rationalizers and self-justifiers which nullifies the work of God and leaves them with an empty appearance of spiritually.
  This type of leadership comes out of an unbroken self-life, brokenness is not a part of their leadership qualities.
  They are more concerned about relationship with religion rather than relationship with God and people.
  They are more concerned about getting rather than giving. Some “Get all they can and can all they get”.
  They are more concerned about how they are perceived rather than revealing who they really are.
  
  Their slogan could be...LISTEN UP, PUT UP and SHUT UP!

• To walk with God you must be free from the fear and control of man, free from the need to be accepted and lauded by man and free from the dependency on man for your supply. Is that what religion provides?
  

• Darkness is the absence of light, never is light the absence of darkness. Light will always dispel darkness, never can darkness dispel light. Be the light of the world that dispels the spiritual darkness of a sin plagued society and lead people from spiritual darkness into where Jesus is the light. It is always the darkness that dies when light is present. “DARKNESS and LIGHT cannot UNITE”!

• The people who try to CONFUSE you in answering your questions may be the ones who are really CONFUSED! Deliberately CONFUSING people does not make you SMART, it just shows how CONFUSED you really are! Both politicians and preachers on times confuse you with facts by not understanding the facts themselves. To mouth off facts without understanding and love is not really truth! To present facts with love, compassion and understanding is truth.
  
  

• To live in FEAR is OVERPAYING on something in the future that 99% of the time never happens! You pay with your PEACE, CONTENTMENT in the present. You pay with your HEALTH in the future! You pay by being not able to enjoy the good memories of the past. Mark PAID IN FULL on the bill of FEAR and live in His perfect LOVE which casts out all FEAR!

• There is a LOVING God that cares very much about you. He is not hung up on or concerned about any mistakes that may be in your past. He stands with open, LOVING arms to receive you as you are! His desire is to develop a relationship with you as a loving Father! There is nothing you have done or may do that thwarts His desire to be in relationship with you!

• If you want to see the glory of God you will see it in Jesus Christ, and what you will see in Him is GRACE, COMPASSION, TRUTH and LOVE! If you want others to see the glory of God demonstrate His GRACE, COMPASSION, TRUTH and LOVE and people will see God’s GLORY and never be the same again!

• The choices you make in life determines where you are in life and your actions in life determine what you become in life. Choose to react to negative circumstances in a positive manner as you trust God!

• I may be able to hide from people in my life but, I cannot hide from people in my heart, because it is impossible to hide from my heart! People who leave loving impressions in your heart, from you will never depart, because they will always be in your heart even if you are far apart!

• To cage eagle is downright sad and those who do it are downright bad, to CAGE PEOPLE by RELIGION is sadder still and those who do it, relationships kill!

• In order to get through TRYING times you must keep TRYING! Going through a TRYING time is not the time to DIE to TRYING. DYING to TRYING is not the path that will lead you through TRYING times.

• Going to “church” every Sunday, being a registered member on the church role, doing more good deeds than bad deeds, joining a bible study, telling others about Jesus, a preacher saying the sinner’s prayer over you does not make you a child of God no more than being in a Dr’s office makes you a Dr.! A personnel relationship between you and God through Jesus is what transforms you to a child of God.

• Religions may possess some truth, but JESUS alone is the TRUTH that will set you FREE!
  

• If you obtain recognition by coercion and manipulation, you will have to maintain it by coercion and manipulation, but what good is it to gain recognition in that way? If you obtain recognition by love and honor it will be protected by respect and favor and you will not have to worry about maintaining it because love and honor maintains it.

• Although Jesus is the living expression of what is on God’s mind and what is in His heart He is more, He is the very HEART of God open for all to see. If you want to know what is on God’s mind, in His heart or what His will is, you will not find it in religion....You must look to Jesus!

• A TRUE LOVE connection is IMPOSSIBLE to SEVER because TRUE LOVE is others-oriented and not self-oriented. The most IMPORTANT ingredient in LIFE is LOVE!
  

• FRIENDSHIP is graced with COURTSHIP, COMPANIONSHIP and FELLOWSHIP, which fosters RELATIONSHIP even during HARDSHIP! FRIENDSHIP is a LIGHTSHIP in the darkness of HARDSHIP!
  

• To be a friend be thoughtfully thoughtful, graciously gracious, sincerely sincere, delightfully delightful, uniquely unique, compassionately compassionate, and lovingly lovely. Be magnificently magnificent, wisely wise, honestly honest, amazingly amazing, and wonderfully wonderful. This will promote you as a FRIENDLY FRIEND!

• Although the light of a single candle cannot be overcome by darkness, it can be hidden by shielding the light with something beyond the extent of its rays. You are the LIGHT of the world, you can cover that light so it will not be seen depending on your ATTITUDE, or let it shine so all the world can see it, depending on your ATTITUDE! Let your ATTITUDE so be as to let your LIGHT SHINE!

• How do you know if a person is a true friend? It is when your friend knows the worst about what you have said or done and LOVES you more, not less because of the knowing of it! That is not to say they agree what you may have done but, they forgive you, feel the hurt you may have caused others or felt yourself and still LOVE you.
  

• If you demonstrate LOVELESS preaching and teaching, the less of Jesus and His spirit you have because He has less of you. The more of His LOVE you demonstrate and share with people the more of the spirit of Jesus you experience because He has more of you. It is not MORE of JESUS WE NEED, it is that JESUS NEEDS MORE of US! RELEASE YOURSELF to JESUS!

• COMPLAINTS are nothing but EXCUSES for not pursing a SOLUTION to a difficult issue! COMPLAINERS COMPLAIN but the COMPLAINT is nothing more than an EXCUSE to avoid the SOLUTION! Be a part of the SOLUTION instead of a part of the COMPLAINER’S POLLUTION to the SOLUTION!

Faith and trust in God will reduce faith and trust in religion!