God makes a way

     

                         

Mario Costeja González has gained immortality by insisting on being forgotten. Whenever he googled his name a 1998 report would appear about his home being auctioned to pay his debts. The European Court of Justice has ruled that Google should remove the link and that there was a “right to be forgotten”. Whether that judgment can be enforced is another matter. But can wrong be forgotten? The Bible says our wrong doing “is engraved with an iron tool” (Jeremiah 17:1). That suggests it cannot be simply forgotten. The good news is that God has made away for our wrong doing to be wiped from the record. Not by Google or anyone else juggling a bit of computer code or by any court but God himself wipes out the charges against us by taking them away and nailing them to the cross (Col 2:14) when we admit our faults to him and ask for forgiveness. Great news!

Blessings,

Ron.

Believing God

Someone recommended the author Beth Moore to me, if you have a kindle or the app on your ipad go to Amazon and download some of her free kindle books. 

I am reading the book in the photo above. It is an easy to read book full of God's Word and His promises. 

As we begin this new year 2014, chapter three 

'Preparing for Wars and Wonders' is particularly interesting....

'Just like the children of Israel, we will always have an enemy that wants to keep us out of our promised lands. In our previous chapter we discussed a few reasons why. Nothing does more damage to the power of darkness in this world system than a present-active-participle believer. If we are going to win our battles, however, were going to have to wise up to some of Satan's schemes and prepare in advance for victory. Our warfare is complicated by opposition that is much harder to identify than human Hittites, Perrizites and Amorites. In Ephesians 6:12-13, the apostle Paul tells us that our "struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities. against the powers of this dark world and against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. Therefore put on the full amour of God"

Among the strategically prescribed pieces of amour, the King James version tells us, "Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked" Why 'above all' do we need to learn to use our shield of faith? Because the shield of faith is the amour's amour. The ancient warrior hoped the fiery dart never reached the helmet or the breastplate. A direct hit on any of the other defensive covers could still stun and bruise even if it didn't wound. The warriors goal was to extinguish any oncoming dart with his shield in order to diffuse all potential damage. When the warriors shield was down, the other pieces of amour were vastly more vulnerable. The same is true in our warfare. Our toughest battles will invariably concern matters of faith - times when we're tempted to think God's Word and His ways wont work for us, that He has abandoned us, let us down, or failed to come through for us. If Satan can get us to drop our shield of faith, he knows we cant remain standing for very long'

So I encourage you as we go into 2014 to use whatever means you can to build your faith in a God who is who He says He is. 

A God who can do what He says He can do.

Knowing that I am who He says I am

I can do all things through Christ

And Gods Word is alive and active in me.

I pray that God will bless you and keep you and make His face to shine upon you and give you His peace

May 2014 be a year of many blessings

Lindsey Toms

Inheritance

Who would throw £4millions away? James Howell did-inadvertently. He recently threw away his computer which disappeared irretrievably into a land fill before he realised the hard disc contained his 7,500 bitcoins. Bitcoins are a computer generated digital currency that has soared in value from $15 last January to over $1,000 this week. 

Bitcoins have long been favoured by libertarians, gold bugs and drug dealers. They escape government controls and can be used, almost anonymously, anywhere they are accepted.

 While feeling sorry for James, I “praise... God [who]...in his great mercy... has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead... into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade. This inheritance is kept in heaven for you”. 

Have you made that inheritance yours yet? I have-the best thing I ever did!

Ron White

Can Google Solve Death?

“Can Google solve death?” ran a headline in the current issue of Time. It added that “the search giant is launching a venture to extend the human life span. That would be crazy-if it weren't Google”. With a world view that believes “everything is solvable if you reduce it to data and then throw enough processing power at it. The project “might one day defeat death itself”. Don`t you think that we should tell the geeks of Silicon Valley that the problem has already been solved. Two thousand years ago the man, Jesus, was publicly executed; certified dead (they speared him through his ribs just to make sure); buried and on the third day after being killed he rose bodily from the dead to be seen alive in public by many people over several weeks. Death has indeed been solved: it has been “swallowed up in victory”. 

Ron White

Forgiveness

Forgiving him “frees us. It keeps us from going to prison with Conor” said Andy and Kate Grosmaire about Conor McBride who admitted murdering their daughter Ann. 

Could I have forgiven like that? I don`t know. 

But I do know that I need forgiveness and that Jesus told a parable about a man who had been forgiven a huge debt, refused to forgive his debtor a trifling sum. The man who did not forgive was told `“I cancelled all that debt of yours because you begged me to. Shouldn't you have had mercy on your fellow servant just as I had on you?”  In anger his master handed him over to the jailers to be tortured, until he paid back all he owed` (Matt 18:32-34).   

Jesus died on the cross to pay my penalty for me so that I might be forgiven. In view of what Jesus has done for me, surely the only proper response is for me to forgive others?

 If I find that difficult, I can count on His grace to help me.

Ron

How do you lead?

What is leadership?
What is good leadership?
How is my leadership?

LEADERS MUST UNDERSTAND WHAT LEADERSHIP IS.
Colossians 3:12  
‘Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.

 Nicky Gumble says  “Leadership is taking people where they want to go. Good Leadership takes people to a place where they do not know where they should be but taking them there.”

Leadership is the act of influencing/serving others out of Christ's interest in their lives so they accomplish God's purposes in for and through them.

Never judge someone without knowing the whole story, you may think you understand but you may not.

As a teenager I was rebellious, I came from a line of rebellious men whose hearts were not towards God but very much distant from Him. I had a negative style of leadership, I could lead people but towards the negative rather than a positive goal.

My heart was not right. I had influemce over my peers but I led people towards war not peace.

The KJV Bible mentions the heart 833 times. What is going on within us is far more important that what is going on externally.  You might present very well to those around you but who are you kidding?

In Matthew 23 Jesus is speaking to the religious whose hearts have been overtaken with the power of their position. Rather than correcting their hearts before God they present well to the world but it a sham.

v23 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices—mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practised the latter, without neglecting the former. 24 You blind guides! You strain out a gnat but swallow a camel. 25 “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. 26 Blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and dish, and then the outside also will be clean.”

Colossians 3:12 ‘Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.’

Influence comes from serving by Instructing, Encouraging, Evaluating, Confronting, Training, Releasing,
Influence does not come by
Overbearing, Criticising,   Manipulating,   Threatening, Competing, Controlling.

Jesus said “If you love me you will obey my Commandments”—a radical commitment to Christ in every Christians life that propels them to act in love with truth no matter what it costs that leader

 Matthew 20:26–27  “Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, 27 and whoever wants to be first must be your slave—“
John 13:16 -16 “Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him”. ; Phil. 2:5-11  “In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:  Who, being in very nature[a] God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;  rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature[b] of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross!
 Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father”

Love has to be your primary motivation to lead, everything else must be secondary, your God given gifts abilities will amount to nothing if your heart is not right.
As leaders our focus is first on God and His purposes for our lives and for those following us.
God’s purpose in using you is to equip and mature those you are leading them into Christ-likeness, and the leaders prime instrument in guiding the followers to become more and more like Christ in their own relationship with God. If you are not living right yourself how can you lead others into anything other than your own hang ups and sins, if there are unresolved issues within us, we will pass them on to others around us.
God’s purpose through the followers is to participate with Him in accomplishing the Great Commission in accordance with their gifts and opportunities.
The leader focuses on both the functional and the foundational in the followers’ lives.
It refers to the followers’ competencies.
The foundational refers to the followers’ character, the core essence of their being on which all they do rests.

The foundational determines how well the leader and the followers function.

Influence comes from serving by Instructing, Encouraging, Evaluating, Confronting, Training, Releasing.Influence does not come by Overbearing, Criticising, Manipulating, Threatening, Competing, Controlling

Blessings. Ray

How do you steer: by the stars or the wake?

How do you steer: by the stars or the wake? A ship`s captain does not lean over the stern of his ship and set his course by looking at the wake; he stands on the bridge and sets his route by the stars; to do anything else would court disaster. God has a plan and purpose for our lives, which are not discerned by looking to our past, however bad or good. Our job is to look up and to trust and obey him. Does anyone love us more than our heavenly father? Is anyone wiser, or more knowledgeable, or more powerful than the creator of the heavens and the earth? It is, therefore, plain daft to rely on our understanding and to do anything other than to trust and obey him.
Ron.

Blessings,