Help My Unbelief - Friday Fragments

I digested this wonderful devotional this evening from Dan Wolgemuth, the president of Youth For Christ - USA, in his "Friday Fragments" weekly newsletter. Enjoy the thought-provoking read!

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Did God actually say… ~ Genesis 3:1

These words, whispered from the craftiest of all creatures, have cascaded through history and into the most intimate and difficult situations that any human being faces.  The shadows of doubt darken the brilliance of God’s promises and commands in a way that dilutes my heart. 

Even this morning, as I was reading through the record of Jesus’ encounter with the father of a son who was consumed by a destructive spirit, I tripped across a word, a single three-letter word, that triggered the very lie that Satan introduced in Genesis. 

All things are possible for one who believes. ~ Mark 9:23

ALL!  You can’t be serious.  This must be one of those classic times when the English language simply does an injustice to the original Greek. 

Like a sprinter out of the starting blocks I raced to my Strong’s Concordance to do a word search.  And as I landed on Strong’s number 3956, I discovered something stunning and amazing… all means all.

Then again… like the same sprinter who is involved in a relay, I handed my doubt off to another companion, to rationalization, to the dismissive excuse of culture or context, to whatever would help me attempt to reconcile the personal promise of Jesus against the present reality of my own experience. 

I chased this doubt across other references in the New Testament only to find an exit ramp into the words of Paul in the book of Romans.  Specifically, the words in the 8th chapter that say: “And we know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” 

This proved even more disturbing.  This gave the potent lie of Satan additional dark black soil in which to plant his “Did God really say” lies.  Did God really mean “all things” in this context as well? 

Once again, the dash for evidence, once again, Strong’s 3956.  Once again, all means all.

“All things are possible…”
“…all things work together…”

Let there be no doubt, God, the only God.  The great I AM, has declared, and He has not stuttered, that All means All. 

Immediately the father of the child cried out and said. “I believe; help my unbelief.” ~ Mark 9:24

Even while we hear the whispered hissing tones of the evil lies that invade our soul, may we have the courage to proclaim… “Yes, God did really say that all means all.” 

Help my unbelief.

Christian Counselor fired for her beliefs

While I was checking my e-mail today, I ran into an article by www.onenewsnow.com and couldn't believe what I was reading. Amuse yourselves with the article, and share your thoughts.

http://www.onenewsnow.com/Legal/Default.aspx?id=182208

McCain - The Lesser of Two Evils?

Conservatives hate McCain. I was recently reading a somewhat-sarcastic column by Ann Coulter, a well-reputed Conservative, and she hit many good points about McCain's positions.

I won't beat around the bush here, because it will serve no good to do this, so I will get to the point here. The majority of conservative Republicans don't trust McCain because he is a liberal Republican.

I trust God fully that He will lead us through the next four years (or even eight, if no solid candidate comes forth that generates excitement for the Conservatives and the liberal candidate/president gets booted), but I sometime wonder what the future holds for this country, and for religious freedom in America. I know that my citizenship resides in heaven alone, but I can't help but wonder what America's future will look like for my descendants.

"Oh, this country will still be a Christian one, even with a Democrat president," you may refute. But I have to question that as well...

Will the citizens' freedom of speech be censored through the passage of an ENDA-like legislation (Employee Non-Discrimination Act)? If such a legislation is passed, all non-profit organizations, especially Christian ones and those who holds similar values, will have to hire people whose actions does not match with the Bible's teachings. Or suppose an employee does not agree with one's lifestyle and refuses to hire him/her/it (given that he/she is a transgender, hence the "it"). Shocker here: he could be arrested on the grounds of "discrimination."

Have you visited McCain's campaign website yet? While he does highlight some of the key issues that voters should be concerned about, he's missing several crucial issues that matters to the followers of Jesus/Christians: the sanctity of marriage, importance of families, freedom of speech and freedom to worship El Shaddai, to name a few. On religious matters, McCain has gone as far to label some key religious leaders as "agents of intolerance" in 2000. No wonder Dr. Dobson, a renowned advocate for the stability of American families and founder of the Focus on Family organization domiciled in Colorado Springs, has not endorsed him thus far - perhaps because Dr. Dobson identifies himself with the agents of intolerance?

McCain's history with legislation votes lean toward the Leftists. If he is elected as our president, I would not be surprised if he decides to impose nonsensical taxes such as "windfall" profits on oil companies, ultimately making us pay more at our gas stations. In addition, he will oppose any further legislation for drillings on only 0.01 percent of the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) with fears of its caribou population being driven to extinction. A liberal acting like a Republican in disguise, indeed.

The future of the 2008 election season, with McCain courting for Conservatives' votes, is looking bleak. I will still vote, but it will boil down to choosing the lesser of the two evils: Obama or McCain. No matter what I choose, the dilemma remains: both of those choices are, figuratively speaking, still evil.

And I won't get started on Obama...

"On That Day..." - WaveSTAFF (formerly NewSTAFF) Insight #2

"Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, my covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the Lord. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more." Jeremiah 31:31-33 (ESV)

God was given many chances to leave (and even destroy) us because we were unfaithful to Him. But He never did. It brings to mind a book in the Bible that talks about God's love for His people, Israel: Hosea. In this book, God commands Hosea to be married to an adulterer, who has openly committed adultery and is not sorry about it. Even with Hosea's ardent passion for his wife, she continues to lie in bed with other men. How horrible is that for a marriage, even by today's standards!?

God humbled Hosea in the very beginning: "Go, take to yourself a wife of whoredom and have children of whoredom, for the land commits great whoredom by forsaking the Lord" (Hosea 1:2). This was difficult for Hosea to accept, and it would be for me. Confession time: if I was Hosea, I would not have listened to God and, instead, chosen a chaste woman. But what happens here? Hosea follows God and marries a prostitute! The level of commitment that God asks of Hosea is incredible, if not mind boggling. However, God is trying to reveal something about His nature that is guaranteed to challenge us in our daily walk with Christ.

No matter how many different gods of this world we have slept with (money, sex, greed, lust, to name a few), God will remain faithful to His promiscuous wife (read: us), even at a great cost. On that day, as was prophesied by Jeremiah, while people, from the past to the present and to the future, continue to wallow and enjoy their adulterous relationships, God demonstrated His love in this manner: He sent His ONLY son to die on the cross for our sake. God did this because He loves us so much, and His love cannot be measured. It extends as far as East is from the West, and He zealously desires us to give Him our all in all.

At the very hour of our belief, the Mosaic Law ordained by God on stone tablets is permanently engraved in our hearts, actively working through our lives by the indwelling Holy Spirit. The God of Abraham, Jacob, Isaac, and Moses is now our personal Father, and we are His adopted children. Just like Hosea, He has forgiven us for all of our iniquities, and remembers them no longer. How amazing is His grace!

Do our teens realize the magnitude of His grace? When we reach out to our teenagers, do they see God as a distant, impersonal being, even as a judge? Or as someone who is jealous, passionate, full of adventure, and even righteously wrathful? Do they know that He actively pursues our hearts daily like a Shepherd who willingly abandons His flock to find a lost ewe?

As believers, we have been enshrined as ministers of the new covenant. Paul points out: we have been made "competent to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit" (2 Corinthians 3:6). God has empowered us through the Holy Spirit to do this: to bear a single message of never-ending hope: God is Love, and Love is God. Has every aspect of your lives illustrated this eternal Truth?