November 17, 2015

From Gary... Wake up!!!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jk-8nM-hYbo

I watched the this video today and agree with her 100%!!!  Our current president has committed many acts during his presidency which are against the best interest of this country, with Benghazi being the current topic. It seems to me that people are just afraid of being called racist, otherwise the incompetence, neglect and outright anti-American attitude of this person would have been cause to remove him during his first term!!!!

I love the Bible because it says it like it is- truthfully!!! Judas betrayed Jesus, Saul (later named Paul) persecuted Christians before his conversion and Peter denied Jesus. In the Old Testament, kings are described as being good and bad. The Bible calls evil, evil and good, good- and there are consequences for both!!! 

I love my country!!!!! The truth is: I would probably not even be a Christian today if a black friend had not given me a Bible way back in 1973. I am not a racist, I am a patriot who believes in the rule of law and that our current president deserves to be removed from office- NOW!!!!   Please watch the video and read the passage from 1 Samuel below (both are long, but worth the time). 

1 Samuel, Chapter 15 (WEB)
 1 Samuel said to Saul, “Yahweh sent me to anoint you to be king over his people, over Israel. Now therefore listen to the voice of Yahweh’s words.  2 Thus says Yahweh of Armies, ‘I have marked that which Amalek did to Israel, how he set himself against him on the way, when he came up out of Egypt.  3 Now go and strike Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and don’t spare them; but kill both man and woman, infant and nursing baby, ox and sheep, camel and donkey.’” 

  4  Saul summoned the people, and numbered them in Telaim, two hundred thousand footmen, and ten thousand men of Judah.  5 Saul came to the city of Amalek, and laid wait in the valley.  6 Saul said to the Kenites, “Go, depart, go down from among the Amalekites, lest I destroy you with them; for you showed kindness to all the children of Israel, when they came up out of Egypt.” So the Kenites departed from among the Amalekites. 

  7  Saul struck the Amalekites, from Havilah as you go to Shur, that is before Egypt.  8 He took Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword.  9 But Saul and the people spared Agag, and the best of the sheep, and of the cattle, and of the fatlings, and the lambs, and all that was good, and wouldn’t utterly destroy them: but everything that was vile and refuse, that they destroyed utterly. 10 Then Yahweh’s word came to Samuel, saying,  11 “It grieves me that I have set up Saul to be king; for he is turned back from following me, and has not performed my commandments.” Samuel was angry; and he cried to Yahweh all night. 

  12  Samuel rose early to meet Saul in the morning; and it was told Samuel, saying, “Saul came to Carmel, and behold, he set up a monument for himself, and turned, and passed on, and went down to Gilgal.” 

  13  Samuel came to Saul; and Saul said to him, “You are blessed by Yahweh! I have performed the commandment of Yahweh.” 

  14  Samuel said, “Then what does this bleating of the sheep in my ears, and the lowing of the cattle which I hear mean?” 

  15  Saul said, “They have brought them from the Amalekites; for the people spared the best of the sheep and of the cattle, to sacrifice to Yahweh your God. We have utterly destroyed the rest.” 

  16  Then Samuel said to Saul, “Stay, and I will tell you what Yahweh has said to me last night.” 

He said to him, “Say on.” 

  17  Samuel said, “Though you were little in your own sight, weren’t you made the head of the tribes of Israel? Yahweh anointed you king over Israel;  18 and Yahweh sent you on a journey, and said, ‘Go, and utterly destroy the sinners the Amalekites, and fight against them until they are consumed.’  19 Why then didn’t you obey the voice of Yahweh, but took the plunder, and did that which was evil in the sight of Yahweh?” 

  20  Saul said to Samuel, “But I have obeyed the voice of Yahweh, and have gone the way which Yahweh sent me, and have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites.  21 But the people took of the plunder, sheep and cattle, the chief of the devoted things, to sacrifice to Yahweh your God in Gilgal.” 

  22  Samuel said, “Has Yahweh as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of Yahweh? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams.  23 For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as idolatry and teraphim.Because you have rejected Yahweh’s word, he has also rejected you from being king.” 

Saul rejected God's word and therefore broke covenant with God, and Barak Obama has violated his oath of office and deserves to be removed as well.  Remember, he took an oath to uphold the constitution and yet he has ignored the rule of law again and again.

Disagree with me? Fine!!! For now, you still have that right, but if the left has their way- that will change.

Wake up- before it is too late and the ISIS flag replaces old glory!!!!

From Gary... Bible Reading November 17


Bible Reading  

November 17

The World English Bible

Nov. 17
Jeremiah 18-21
Jer 18:1 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, saying,
Jer 18:2 Arise, and go down to the potter's house, and there I will cause you to hear my words.
Jer 18:3 Then I went down to the potter's house, and behold, he was making a work on the wheels.
Jer 18:4 When the vessel that he made of the clay was marred in the hand of the potter, he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.
Jer 18:5 Then the word of Yahweh came to me, saying,
Jer 18:6 House of Israel, can't I do with you as this potter? says Yahweh. Behold, as the clay in the potter's hand, so are you in my hand, house of Israel.
Jer 18:7 At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up and to break down and to destroy it;
Jer 18:8 if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do to them.
Jer 18:9 At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it;
Jer 18:10 if they do that which is evil in my sight, that they not obey my voice, then I will repent of the good, with which I said I would benefit them.
Jer 18:11 Now therefore, speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I frame evil against you, and devise a device against you: return you now everyone from his evil way, and amend your ways and your doings.
Jer 18:12 But they say, It is in vain; for we will walk after our own devices, and we will do everyone after the stubbornness of his evil heart.
Jer 18:13 Therefore thus says Yahweh: Ask you now among the nations, who has heard such things; the virgin of Israel has done a very horrible thing.
Jer 18:14 Shall the snow of Lebanon fail from the rock of the field? or shall the cold waters that flow down from afar be dried up?
Jer 18:15 For my people have forgotten me, they have burned incense to false gods; and they have been made to stumble in their ways, in the ancient paths, to walk in byways, in a way not built up;
Jer 18:16 to make their land an astonishment, and a perpetual hissing; everyone who passes thereby shall be astonished, and shake his head.
Jer 18:17 I will scatter them as with an east wind before the enemy; I will show them the back, and not the face, in the day of their calamity.
Jer 18:18 Then said they, Come, and let us devise devices against Jeremiah; for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, and let us strike him with the tongue, and let us not give heed to any of his words.
Jer 18:19 Give heed to me, Yahweh, and listen to the voice of those who contend with me.
Jer 18:20 Shall evil be recompensed for good? for they have dug a pit for my soul. Remember how I stood before you to speak good for them, to turn away your wrath from them.
Jer 18:21 Therefore deliver up their children to the famine, and give them over to the power of the sword; and let their wives become childless, and widows; and let their men be slain of death, and their young men struck of the sword in battle.
Jer 18:22 Let a cry be heard from their houses, when you shall bring a troop suddenly on them; for they have dug a pit to take me, and hid snares for my feet.
Jer 18:23 Yet, Yahweh, you know all their counsel against me to kill me; don't forgive their iniquity, neither blot out their sin from your sight; but let them be overthrown before you; deal you with them in the time of your anger.
Jer 19:1 Thus said Yahweh, Go, and buy a potter's earthen bottle, and take of the elders of the people, and of the elders of the priests;
Jer 19:2 and go forth to the valley of the son of Hinnom, which is by the entry of the gate Harsith, and proclaim there the words that I shall tell you;
Jer 19:3 and say, Hear you the word of Yahweh, kings of Judah, and inhabitants of Jerusalem: thus says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, Behold, I will bring evil on this place, which whoever hears, his ears shall tingle.
Jer 19:4 Because they have forsaken me, and have estranged this place, and have burned incense in it to other gods, that they didn't know, they and their fathers and the kings of Judah; and have filled this place with the blood of innocents,
Jer 19:5 and have built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons in the fire for burnt offerings to Baal; which I didn't command, nor spoke it, neither came it into my mind:
Jer 19:6 therefore, behold, the days come, says Yahweh, that this place shall no more be called Topheth, nor The valley of the son of Hinnom, but The valley of Slaughter.
Jer 19:7 I will make void the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place; and I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life: and their dead bodies will I give to be food for the birds of the sky, and for the animals of the earth.
Jer 19:8 I will make this city an astonishment, and a hissing; everyone who passes thereby shall be astonished and hiss because of all its plagues.
Jer 19:9 I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters; and they shall eat everyone the flesh of his friend, in the siege and in the distress, with which their enemies, and those who seek their life, shall distress them.
Jer 19:10 Then you shall break the bottle in the sight of the men who go with you,
Jer 19:11 and shall tell them, Thus says Yahweh of Armies: Even so will I break this people and this city, as one breaks a potter's vessel, that can't be made whole again; and they shall bury in Topheth, until there be no place to bury.
Jer 19:12 Thus will I do to this place, says Yahweh, and to its inhabitants, even making this city as Topheth:
Jer 19:13 and the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judah, which are defiled, shall be as the place of Topheth, even all the houses on whose roofs they have burned incense to all the army of the sky, and have poured out drink offerings to other gods.
Jer 19:14 Then came Jeremiah from Topheth, where Yahweh had sent him to prophesy; and he stood in the court of Yahweh's house, and said to all the people:
Jer 19:15 Thus says Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, Behold, I will bring on this city and on all its towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it; because they have made their neck stiff, that they may not hear my words.
Jer 20:1 Now Pashhur, the son of Immer the priest, who was chief officer in the house of Yahweh, heard Jeremiah prophesying these things.
Jer 20:2 Then Pashhur struck Jeremiah the prophet, and put him in the stocks that were in the upper gate of Benjamin, which was in the house of Yahweh.
Jer 20:3 It happened on the next day, that Pashhur brought forth Jeremiah out of the stocks. Then said Jeremiah to him, Yahweh has not called your name Pashhur, but Magormissabib.
Jer 20:4 For thus says Yahweh, Behold, I will make you a terror to yourself, and to all your friends; and they shall fall by the sword of their enemies, and your eyes shall see it; and I will give all Judah into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall carry them captive to Babylon, and shall kill them with the sword.
Jer 20:5 Moreover I will give all the riches of this city, and all its gains, and all the precious things of it, yes, all the treasures of the kings of Judah will I give into the hand of their enemies; and they shall make them a prey, and take them, and carry them to Babylon.
Jer 20:6 You, Pashhur, and all who dwell in your house shall go into captivity; and you shall come to Babylon, and there you shall die, and there you shall be buried, you, and all your friends, to whom you have prophesied falsely.
Jer 20:7 Yahweh, you have persuaded me, and I was persuaded; you are stronger than I, and have prevailed: I am become a laughing-stock all the day, every one mocks me.
Jer 20:8 For as often as I speak, I cry out; I cry, Violence and destruction! because the word of Yahweh is made a reproach to me, and a derision, all the day.
Jer 20:9 If I say, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name, then there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I am weary with forbearing, and I can't contain.
Jer 20:10 For I have heard the defaming of many, terror on every side. Denounce, and we will denounce him, say all my familiar friends, those who watch for my fall; peradventure he will be persuaded, and we shall prevail against him, and we shall take our revenge on him.
Jer 20:11 But Yahweh is with me as an awesome mighty one: therefore my persecutors shall stumble, and they shall not prevail; they shall be utterly disappointed, because they have not dealt wisely, even with an everlasting dishonor which shall never be forgotten.
Jer 20:12 But, Yahweh of Armies, who tests the righteous, who sees the heart and the mind, let me see your vengeance on them; for to you have I revealed my cause.
Jer 20:13 Sing to Yahweh, praise you Yahweh; for he has delivered the soul of the needy from the hand of evildoers.
Jer 20:14 Cursed be the day in which I was born: don't let the day in which my mother bore me be blessed.
Jer 20:15 Cursed be the man who brought news to my father, saying, A boy is born to you; making him very glad.
Jer 20:16 Let that man be as the cities which Yahweh overthrew, and didn't repent: and let him hear a cry in the morning, and shouting at noontime;
Jer 20:17 because he didn't kill me from the womb; and so my mother would have been my grave, and her womb always great.
Jer 20:18 Why came I forth out of the womb to see labor and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame?
Jer 21:1 The word which came to Jeremiah from Yahweh, when king Zedekiah sent to him Pashhur the son of Malchijah, and Zephaniah the son of Maaseiah, the priest, saying,
Jer 21:2 Please inquire of Yahweh for us; for Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon makes war against us: peradventure Yahweh will deal with us according to all his wondrous works, that he may go up from us.
Jer 21:3 Then said Jeremiah to them, You shall tell Zedekiah:
Jer 21:4 Thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel, Behold, I will turn back the weapons of war that are in your hands, with which you fight against the king of Babylon, and against the Chaldeans who besiege you, without the walls; and I will gather them into the midst of this city.
Jer 21:5 I myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand and with a strong arm, even in anger, and in wrath, and in great indignation.
Jer 21:6 I will strike the inhabitants of this city, both man and animal: they shall die of a great pestilence.
Jer 21:7 Afterward, says Yahweh, I will deliver Zedekiah king of Judah, and his servants, and the people, even such as are left in this city from the pestilence, from the sword, and from the famine, into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and into the hand of their enemies, and into the hand of those who seek their life: and he shall strike them with the edge of the sword; he shall not spare them, neither have pity, nor have mercy.
Jer 21:8 To this people you shall say, Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death.
Jer 21:9 He who remains in this city shall die by the sword, and by the famine, and by the pestilence; but he who goes out, and passes over to the Chaldeans who besiege you, he shall live, and his life shall be to him for a prey.
Jer 21:10 For I have set my face on this city for evil, and not for good, says Yahweh: it shall be given into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall burn it with fire.
Jer 21:11 Touching the house of the king of Judah, hear you the word of Yahweh:
Jer 21:12 House of David, thus says Yahweh, Execute justice in the morning, and deliver him who is robbed out of the hand of the oppressor, lest my wrath go forth like fire, and burn so that none can quench it, because of the evil of your doings.
Jer 21:13 Behold, I am against you, O inhabitant of the valley, and of the rock of the plain, says Yahweh; you that say, Who shall come down against us? or who shall enter into our habitations?
Jer 21:14 I will punish you according to the fruit of your doings, says Yahweh; and I will kindle a fire in her forest, and it shall devour all that is around her.


Nov. 17
Hebrews 3

Heb 3:1 Therefore, holy brothers, partakers of a heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Jesus;
Heb 3:2 who was faithful to him who appointed him, as also was Moses in all his house.
Heb 3:3 For he has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who built the house has more honor than the house.
Heb 3:4 For every house is built by someone; but he who built all things is God.
Heb 3:5 Moses indeed was faithful in all his house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were afterward to be spoken,
Heb 3:6 but Christ is faithful as a Son over his house; whose house we are, if we hold fast our confidence and the glorying of our hope firm to the end.
Heb 3:7 Therefore, even as the Holy Spirit says, "Today if you will hear his voice,
Heb 3:8 don't harden your hearts, as in the provocation, like as in the day of the trial in the wilderness,
Heb 3:9 where your fathers tested me by proving me, and saw my works for forty years.
Heb 3:10 Therefore I was displeased with that generation, and said, 'They always err in their heart, but they didn't know my ways;'
Heb 3:11 as I swore in my wrath, 'They will not enter into my rest.' "
Heb 3:12 Beware, brothers, lest perhaps there be in any one of you an evil heart of unbelief, in falling away from the living God;
Heb 3:13 but exhort one another day by day, so long as it is called "today;" lest any one of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.
Heb 3:14 For we have become partakers of Christ, if we hold fast the beginning of our confidence firm to the end:
Heb 3:15 while it is said, "Today if you will hear his voice, don't harden your hearts, as in the rebellion."
Heb 3:16 For who, when they heard, rebelled? No, didn't all those who came out of Egypt by Moses?
Heb 3:17 With whom was he displeased forty years? Wasn't it with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness?
Heb 3:18 To whom did he swear that they wouldn't enter into his rest, but to those who were disobedient?
Heb 3:19 We see that they were not able to enter in because of unbelief.

From Roy Davison... The Lord your God is testing you



The Lord your God is testing you

“The LORD your God is testing you to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul” (Deuteronomy 13:3).
Our life is a testing-ground for eternity. “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body, according to what he has done, whether good or bad” (2 Corinthians 5:10).

We need to examine ourselves.
In preparation for a test, students review their work and check their knowledge. We must examine ourselves to see whether we are meeting God’s expectations. “Let us search out and examine our ways, and turn back to the LORD” (Lamentations 3:40). “Let each one examine his own work” (Galatians 6:4). “Let a man examine himself” (1 Corinthians 11:28). “Examine yourselves as to whether you are in the faith.1 Test yourselves” (2 Corinthians 13:5).
To effectively examine ourselves, it is helpful to know how God has tested mankind through the ages so we can understand how He is testing us now.

God tests everyone, including the righteous.
“His eyes behold, His eyelids test the sons of men. The LORD tests the righteous” (Psalm 11:4, 5).
Belshazzar, king of Babylon, was terrified when he saw the handwriting on the wall: “Mene, mene, tekel, uphasin.” Daniel explained that “tekel” meant, “You have been weighed in the balances, and found wanting” (see Daniel 5:25-28).
The most severe tests in the Bible were experienced by men of faith. Abraham was asked to offer his son;2 Job lost his children, lost his possessions, and his body was covered “with painful boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head”;3 Joseph4 was sold into slavery by his own brothers and was imprisoned unjustly because of his integrity; Daniel was thrown in the lion’s den for faithfully praying to God.
These servants of God were strengthened by the trials they endured, and became examples of faith for others to follow down through the ages.

God tests our hearts and minds.
“The righteous God tests the hearts and minds” (Psalm 7:9). “The refining pot is for silver and the furnace for gold, but the LORD tests the hearts” (Proverbs 17:3).5
God explains: “I, the LORD, search the heart, I test the mind, even to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his doings” (Jeremiah 17:10).

God tests our faith and love.
“Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance” (James 1:2, 3 NASB). When we remain faithful in spite of “various trials” it proves “the genuineness” of our faith (1 Peter 1:6, 7).
“The LORD your God is testing you to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul” (Deuteronomy 13:3).

Faith and love are tested by obedience.
Abraham was tested to know whether he feared God. “Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham” (Genesis 22:1). After Abraham showed his willingness to offer Isaac, God said: “Now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me” (Genesis 22:12).
God gave the Sabbath command to test Israel. They were to gather manna on six days, but not on the seventh, “that I may test them, whether they will walk in My law or not” (Exodus 16:4).
Jesus said, “If you love Me, keep My commandments” (John 14:15).

Faith and love are tested by hardship.
Israel was tested in the wilderness: “You shall remember that the LORD your God led you all the way these forty years in the wilderness, to humble you and test you, to know what wasin your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. So He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna which you did not know nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man shall not live by bread alone; but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the LORD” (Deuteronomy 8:2, 3).6
Going through the Red Sea prefigured our baptism (1 Corinthians 10:1, 2). Entering the promised land prefigured our final rest (Hebrews 4:8-11). God tests us during our wanderings through the wilderness of this life.

God sometimes withdraws to test us. 
Hezekiah, one of the most faithful kings of Judah, was tested in this way: “God withdrew from him, in order to test him, that He might know all that was in his heart” (2 Chronicles 32:31).
Do you sometimes feel that God has forsaken you? He may be testing your faith and love. Remember that Jesus also felt forsaken by God when He was hanging on the cross for you (Matthew 27:46).

The Messiah refines His people by fire.
Referring to the promised Christ, God warned: “But who can endure the day of His coming? And who can stand when He appears? For He is like a refiner’s fire and like launderers’ soap.7 He will sit as a refiner and a purifier of silver; He will purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver” (Malachi 3:2, 3).8
Metals are purged and refined by fire to remove impurities. Silver melts at 962°C. Gold melts at 1064°C.
When I was thirteen our class visited the Kaiser Steel Mill at Fontana, California. I vividly remember the white-hot liquid metal flowing from the bottom of the blast furnace into moulds. Huge hammers pounded large, red-hot ingots into glowing flat slabs of steel that were then rolled under great pressure into sheets. Heat and pressure are required to produce steel sheeting from iron ore.
Heat and pressure of a different kind refine the people of God. “Behold, I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction” (Isaiah 48:10).
Jesus himself “learned obedience by the things which He suffered” (Hebrews 5:8) and His followers share in His suffering. “Yes, and all who desire to live godly in Christ Jesus will suffer persecution” (2 Timothy 3:12).
“Beloved, do not think it strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened to you; but rejoice to the extent that you partake of Christ’s sufferings, that when His glory is revealed, you may also be glad with exceeding joy” (1 Peter 4:12, 13).
Jesus comforted the believers at Smyrna: “Do not fear any of those things which you are about to suffer. Indeed, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison, that you may be tested, and you will have tribulation ten days. Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life” (Revelation 2:10).

The fruitfulness of our faith is tested.
Jesus said: “I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit” (John 15:1, 2).
Notice that all branches are cut. The fruitless are chopped off, the fruitful are pruned.

Our work will be tested by fire.
Paul writes: “I have laid the foundation, and another builds on it. But let each one take heed how he builds on it. For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if anyone builds on this foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, each one’s work will become clear; for the Day will declare it, because it will be revealed by fire; and the fire will test each one’s work, of what sort it is” (1 Corinthians 3:10-13).
This does not refer to our own salvation9 but to God’s testing those we teach. How we preach and worship can influence the type of people we attract and whether we build with straw or with precious stones.
Apostate churches use worldly means to entice people, such as imposing buildings, pageantry with colorful costumes, and instrumental music.
Some congregations build with straw by using worldly attractions to entice people, for example, with what they call a “contemporary service” with loud instrumental music. One young woman, who had attended such a service at what once had been a church of Christ, said, “It was great! We were up dancing10 on the tables!”
Some use worldly allurements to attract people in the hope that eventually their attention might be redirected to spiritual things. But how spiritual is this approach? Can we picture Paul and Barnabas playing “Christian rock” to draw a crowd?
Jesus said: “And I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all peoples to Myself” (John 12:32). Paul declared: “I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes” (Romans 1:16).
They who resort to worldly attractions lack faith in the drawing power of Christ and the gospel!
Entertainment attracts straw. Gold, silver and precious stones are harder to find, but they can withstand the fire. Hearts of gold are won when we exalt Christ and give them what they cannot find elsewhere, the undiluted and unadulterated doctrine of Christ.

False religions test us.
God allowed the surrounding heathen nations to test Israel: “Because this nation has transgressed My covenant which I commanded their fathers, and has not heeded My voice, I also will no longer drive out before them any of the nations which Joshua left when he died, so that through them I may test Israel, whether they will keep the ways of the LORD, to walk in them as their fathers kept them, or not” (Judges 2:20-22).
In our time God allows denominations with their confusing, contradictory and unscriptural doctrines and practices to test our faith and love. Will we serve God simply as Christians, members of the one body, the church of Christ?11 Or do we prefer a denomination of human origin?

Miracles of false teachers test us.
To test people, God sometimes allows false teachers to perform wonders: “If there arises among you a prophet or a dreamer of dreams, and he gives you a sign or a wonder, and the sign or the wonder comes to pass, of which he spoke to you, saying, ‘Let us go after other gods’ - which you have not known - ‘and let us serve them,’ you shall not listen to the words of that prophet or that dreamer of dreams, for the LORD your God is testing you to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul. You shall walk after the LORD your God and fear Him, and keep His commandments and obey His voice; you shall serve Him and hold fast to Him” (Deuteronomy 13:1-4).
People are tested now the same way. Jesus warned: “For false christs and false prophets will rise and show signs and wonders to deceive, if possible, even the elect” (Mark 13:22).12
Certain denominations use apparitions, wonders and signs to lead people astray. Two examples:
In 1858 a girl of 14 in Lourdes, France claimed that Mary had appeared to her in a cave. Since then this has been used to encourage people to worship an image, which is contrary to God’s word (Exodus 20:4; 1 Corinthians 10:14).
There are people who claim to speak in tongues, yet women lead in their assemblies, something forbidden by God (1 Corinthians 14:34, 37).
By signs and wonders people are tested to see whether they want to obey God’s word or follow their own feelings and emotions.

We are tested by division.
Paul wrote to the Corinthians: “First of all, when you come together as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you, and in part I believe it. For there must also be factions among you, that those who are approved may be recognized among you” (1 Corinthians 11:18, 19).
Jesus prayed for unity (John 17:20-23) but not for unity at the expense of truth. He prayed for unity based on God’s word (John 17:14, 17). When division comes - caused by people who depart from the truth - this “parting of the ways” purges and purifies the church. The unfaithful are chopped off, the faithful are pruned, and those who are approved can be recognized.

What have we learned?
“The LORD your God is testing you to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul” (Deuteronomy 13:3).
We need to examine ourselves. God tests the hearts and minds of the righteous. He tests our faith and love by means of obedience and hardship. He sometimes withdraws to test us. The Messiah refines His people by fire. The fruitfulness of our faith and the quality of our work are tested. False religions, lying wonders and division test our respect for God’s word.
“Be diligent to present yourself approved to God” (2 Timothy 2:15). Amen.
Roy Davison
Endnotes

1 To be “in the faith” is much more than merely believing that God exists. “As you therefore have received Christ Jesus the Lord, so walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him and established in the faith, as you have been taught, abounding in it with thanksgiving” (Colossians 2:6, 7). We are “in the faith” if we serve God according to the faith that was once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 4).
2 “By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, ‘In Isaac your seed shall be called,’ concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense” (Hebrews 11:17-19).
3 Job 2:7.
4 Referring to the trials of Joseph it is said, “The word of the LORD tested him” (Psalm 105:19; see verses 16-21).
5 David prayed: “I know also, my God, that You test the heart and have pleasure in uprightness” (1 Chronicles 29:17). “Examine me, O LORD, and prove me; try my mind and my heart” (Psalm 26:2). Paul wrote: “But as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the gospel, even so we speak, not as pleasing men, but God who tests our hearts” (1 Thessalonians 2:4).
6 Moses warned Israel not to forsake the Lord, “who led you through that great and terrible wilderness, in which were fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty land where there was no water; who brought water for you out of the flinty rock; who fed you in the wilderness with manna, which your fathers did not know, that He might humble you and that He might test you, to do you good in the end” (Deuteronomy 8:15, 16).
7 Or “the lye soap of the fuller” referring to the cleansing and whitening of wool in preparation for cloth making.
8 “Awake, O sword, against My Shepherd, against the Man who is My Companion,” says the LORD of hosts. “Strike the Shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered; then I will turn My hand against the little ones. And it shall come to pass in all the land,” says the LORD, “that two- thirds in it shall be cut off and die, but one-third shall be left in it: I will bring the one-third through the fire, will refine them as silver is refined, and test them as gold is tested. They will call on My name, and I will answer them. I will say, ‘This is My people’; And each one will say, ‘The LORD is my God’” (Zechariah 13:7-9).
9 “If anyone’s work which he has built on it endures, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned, he will suffer loss; but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire” (1 Corinthians 3:14, 15).
10 This was said several years ago. Recently, on February 27 & 28, 2015, this congregation held “Daddy Daughter” dances costing $25 per dad and $5 per daughter (ages 4 through 12). “Come for dancing, dinner, dessert, carriage ride, photo booth, and crafts!” (downloaded on February 28, 2015 from http://www.thehills.org).
11 The church is the body of Christ (Colossians 1:24) and there is only “one body” (Ephesians 4:4).
12 Paul explained: “The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved” (2 Thessalonians 2:9, 10).
The Scripture quotations in this article are from
The New King James Version. ©1979,1980,1982,
Thomas Nelson Inc., Publishers, unless indicated otherwise.
Permission for reference use has been granted.

Published in The Old Paths Archive
http://www.oldpaths.com

From Jim McGuiggan... HERBIE'S COMMITMENT & MINE

HERBIE'S COMMITMENT & MINE

So the nine or ten year-old Herbie has heard that God needs volunteers to fight the war against the satanic and demonic forces that sweep the world into moral lunacy, cruelty and heartlessness and impurity! It’s going to be a long hard brawl with a lot of pain and loss but it’s the right war and it’s a war that God and his companions will win! Sensing that and with the beauty and innocence that can be found in the hearts of children the boy writes: “Dear God, count me in! Your friend, Herbie.” *  
There’s commitment!
I don’t know that my commitment was ever that pure or innocent but like millions of others I can’t deny that whatever was in me I gave it and whatever is in me I give it still. Mine wasn’t and isn’t Herbie’s personal commitment for his personal commitment was wrapped up in and shaped by his unique personhood and heart—only he could give his “count me in.”
Why is it then that his words move me so? Why do I want to make them mine? And I do! I really do! However wretched I feel myself to be at times there is something down in me that admires such a Herbian commitment and for me to admire it says something about me. I am one of the very many people whose inner wiring makes me more than reluctant to believe or say anything good about myself—it isn’t humility—it’s unhealthy; but it’s there and it is what it is.
[I don’t say God can’t or doesn’t use me for his good purposes—he does though for some people what I say on a couple of subjects is blasphemous or close to it. That might explain why the number of visitors to this site has dropped truly dramatically. In any case, some people think God uses me for good. My point is that God can use any of us for his good even if we don’t care for him or if we're truly unprofitable servants as I almost always see myself as being. Luke 17.10 is saying more than I'm saying here but that's for another time.]
Back to Herbie and me. I don’t at all like me [even though I believe God loves me and uses me for good from time to time] and yet I so admire the spirit of Herbie and that kind of thing delivers me from total unbridled self-dislike and the paralysis that that generates in some of us. There’s something down in me that admires something morally beautiful, something that I want to imitate, something I may not be able in this life to match but something I’d dearly long to be part of me, something I would love to be able to claim is mine also. I’ve given and do give what I’ve got but I admire more than I’ve given, more than I’ve been able to give. Still, what does that admiration or longing for what is better and lovelier say about me?
My commitment to God is real but it comes short of the purity and loveliness and innocence of a gallant little boy. I’m saying that because I am proud of him when I look at his gallantry and I hunger to be like him and that says something about me that can't be bad. God has been at work in me--there's no denying that. 
In the movie As Good As It Gets, the dysfunctional and compulsive Mr. Udhall is centered on himself and is abusive to all around him. He recognizes his insolence, his crass selfishness and isn’t capable of caring much about these traits…until he meets up with Carol the waitress. Getting to know her makes him aware of what he was already aware of and didn’t regret; now he doesn’t like himself; she and her way underscored his miserable and miserly persona. Later in desperation he gate-crashes his therapist’s office and gets no help there but Carol continues to influence him and while he isn’t “cured” he wants better and some of his speech and actions express that. As the movie closes Udhall feels some inner rays of hope, maybe he’s really changing for the better and just before they go into a cafeteria [him still skipping over the cracks in the pavement] he tells Carol that he sees fine things in her that other don’t see but the very fact that, “see them says something about me.” For him it was a sign that maybe down inside there was something more than weakness, rudeness, self-centeredness and such, something had wakened in him and he was glad to see it and he was going along with its flow.
I want to believe, can’t help believing that because I so admire Herbie and the glory of his commitment that that says something about me; maybe I'm not as wretched as I constantly tell myself I am. I want God to count me in, I want to call myself His friend. If there’s any truth in any of the above and it says something about me, it must say something about you too.
* See "Herbie's Prayer".
Spending Time with Jim McGuiggan