A Sacrifice of Thanksgiving

Abraham Lincoln proclaimed Thanksgiving as a national holiday in 1863. That special day was set apart for the American people to gather in their churches and with their families to corporately as a nation express their thanksgiving to God for all His blessings. Our nation and her people have been truly been blessed by God  despite all her flaws and uncertainties. We have in the past and still today enjoy an abundance of freedom in this country unequalled to any place else in the world. We have a freedom and liberty that many people of other nations can only dream about. This country has offered it’s people a lifestyle that is attainable for those who set goals and work hard to achieve them. She has provided it’s people with a greater opportunity to be successful than any other nation on earth.  But even more than that, she has granted her people with a religious right to choose whom and how they would put their faith and trust and hope to believe. I for one am thankful today and each day for that right and freedom more than any other, that I hold dear. I do not have to hide in a nearby closet to worship, or offer praise to the One that has allocated to me, this freedom.

 

As I think of those blessings and all that I have, it only stands to reason that I would pause and think of those things that the Pilgrims did not have. No people were more underprivileged than that small band of migrants that journeyed to the new land on the Mayflower in search of a religious freedom to worship how they believed. There may come a time that the people of God will search again for another place that they can serve and   worship the living God in freedom. But for now, I shout it from the mountain tops and the valleys way low…. “I will offer to thee the sacrifice of thanksgiving and will call upon the name of the Lord.” Psalm 116:17…and “Oh that men would praise the Lord for his goodness and for his wonderful works to the children of men and let them sacrifice the sacrifices of thanksgiving and declare his works with rejoicing.” Psalm 107:21-22.  

God Has Blessed America!

Happy Thanksgiving Sweet Friends!
Bren

WHAT CHRISTMAS HAS TO DO WITH A DEMON POSSESSED MAN

The song, I'll be Home for Christmas is perhaps one of the inner longings that many people have as the holiday season approaches. For many who are far away from their home and loved ones they, more than anyone else, can appreciate this wonderful old song. In thinking about Christmas this year and that song, I am reminded of a story in the Bible that tells of a poor wretch that was far from his home and family. As a matter of fact the scriptures tell us that the man had fixed his home among the tombs in a graveyard, where he dwelt day and night. This man had been possessed with a legion of evil spirits that had driven him to madness and was the terror of all who passed by him. At some point the local authorities had attempted to control him by binding him with irons and chains. But out of his madness and unwillingness to be controlled, he overcame the irons and chains, and roamed naked and aimlessly, in his personal torment. This man was a misery to himself as well as a burden to his community. He was in constant mental pain and torment roaming around aimlessly night and day throughout the hills, crying fearfully, cutting himself with sharp flints of stone, torturing his poor body in the most frightful ways.

 

Then one day the Son of the Living God passed by him and said to the evil spirits that were possessing his mind, to come out of him; and the man was healed in that moment. As Jesus got into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged Jesus, that he might go with Him.  But Jesus did not permit him, but told him to go home to his friends and tell them what great things that Jesus had done for him, and about the compassion that Jesus had for and on him.  What Jesus wanted the man to understand was that he was given a new purpose in life now. That he had received the most precious gift, which was spiritual freedom. The peace that the world longs for and sings about today had entered the heart of the man that had been captive by demonic sin and set free to live and serve the one who had delivered him from his bondage. Jesus knew that the man could be more effective among those that knew him when he was out of his mind and now saw him in the delivered condition that he was in. His testimony would take the gospel to places that Jesus Himself may not have visited.  

 

It is a great delusion to think that we are islands to ourselves. For that way of thinking causes us to be an enemy of the true purpose of spreading the gospel. The kind of Christianity that Christ imparted to that man that day is the kind of Christianity that makes a husband a better husband, a wife a better wife. It does not free us from our duties as children, it makes us better children, better parents, better families. Instead of weakening our love for one another, it gives us a fresh reason for our affection towards one another. It was never meant to interfere with relationships, but was intended to cement them and to make them so strong that death itself cannot sever.

 

I wish it were Christmas every day in the year if it would help us have more opportunity to come together and share with friends and family the good news of what Christ has done for us. If you have never taken the opportunity at Christmas or any holiday to do so, as this coming Christmas time rolls around again, let me encourage you to do the same thing that Jesus told the man in this story to do when he said, "Go home to thy friends, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee, and hath had compassion on thee." Mark 5:19. For the Christian, Christmas is all about Christ coming to set captives free and in the life of the man spoken about in Mark chapter 5, he found out for himself the true meaning of Christmas the day Christ set him free.

Keeping Christ in Christmas,

Bren

BEING THANKFUL

 

It's hard to cultivate a sense of gratitude when you're angry, frustrated, or anxious over something that has not gone the way that you wanted or expected. If we do not deal with them properly they become barriers to our being thankful and even kind. Don’t be so busy dwelling on the past or thinking about your future, that you don’t fully notice how good things are or even can be right now, if you change your attitude about them. Dwelling on the past as well as the future can open the door to comparison, which is the only way that you will perceive something as not good enough. What you have now is all that exists and comparing that to something that doesn't exist anymore is an easy way to foster dissatisfaction which causes unhappiness in your life and torture yourself over them. People with a strong sense of gratitude, love and appreciation are not luckier people because they feel that way. They merely recognize and see the blessings in their lives and focus on them, and less on what they don’t have. I read once that people who count their blessings are generally happier and healthier than people who don't, and I truly believe that. I know it places me in a much better mood whenever my attitude is in check.

 

Often times we miss recognizing our blessings because we tend to slip out of our consciousness or awareness of them simply because we get so used to them being a part of our surroundings. We must teach ourselves to notice the little things in our lives and make the effort to deliberately appreciate them. Never struggle and waste your time and energy over why things happen the way they do! Just use them to gird and strengthen yourself for the next time, because for the most part, there is always another challenge right around the corner waiting on you. It’s never too late, start this Thanksgiving by practicing an attitude of gratitude and thankfulness. You might even begin to see a change in those around you as your attitude changes and rubs off on them. God’s word teaches us the importance of these very things, yet we are a forgetful people; and that in and of itself is something to be very grateful for! We are the Sheep of His pasture and He has called us out of those hard places and into a better way of living, if we are in Christ Jesus. Are you in Christ Jesus today sweet friend? If so, then…. “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Philippians 4:6-7

Love you and Happy Thanksgiving!

Bren

WHAT ARE YOU ALLOWING GOD TO FORM IN YOU?

One of the most amazing and majestic wonders on this earth in my opinion are the great, “Grand Canyons”. While I have never seen them in person, I have awed in wonder over the pictures that have displayed the beauty and grandeur and the stories of how they were formed.  The Canyons are simply chasms that reach down into the deepest parts of the earth’s surface. Apart from the few trees and shrubs that are able to attach itself to the sides or walls inside the canyons and at the base of them, everything else is virtually lifeless. Once where life was, is now a world of fossilized limestone and sandstone within its crusty cliffs. God used powerful forces to impact the canyons, with erosion from ice, water, volcano and winds, that all together contributed to the formation that is now the majestic wonder that it is. Sometimes, God uses a similar force in our lives that runs like a curvy river that tries to push out of us pride, selfishness and other sin. There are times in our lives when we give our marriage vows a Judas kiss, and thoughtlessly slice another’s low self-esteem with a razor blade tongue. Often times when we need to be a blessing to our enemy, or someone we think is unworthy of our compassion, we pass sludge’s of rocks and mud onto them, instead of the bread of kindness. Even as a river carves out a mountain, our love can created a river flowing with love and compassion or a wedge that can prevent the loveliness of God in us to pass through us, to reach the places that are dry in our own lives, as well as allowing it to form a bridge that transforms the old in us, to something with more splendor and beauty.

In I Corinthians 13, Paul lays out the blueprint for the bridge that will transform our lives into a majestic wonder if we will allow it to cut through the rock and sediment of wrong choices and waywardness against the One who created us and loves us the most. For he states, “If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. 4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. 8 Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. 12 For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known. 13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Would you take a minute with me and close your eyes. In your mind roll back the tape of your life. Listen to the way that you talk. See the way that you appear not only  to others, but to God through His eyes. How have you treated others, really treated them. Are you quick to get on Facebook and spew out revenge on someone that has hurt you by your own words. Are you really any better than they are in God’s eyes, not merely your own, by which of course is the standard that you are judging them with, and not Gods. Have you been seeking the highest good you can find in others, or is it much easier to jump on the bad that you see in their lives. Are you bridging the gaping canyon in your own heart with love, or are you allowing it to further separate you from the will of God in your personal life. A famous quote by William Shakespeare says this, “God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.” Could this be true of you today sweet friend? We are constantly feeling the pull from the stress caused by life’s daily problems to pull out which ever face we may need, to cover up what sin in us, is stirring up. But if we are in Christ, we must make every effort to neglect the desire that lingers at our door to treat others as sometimes we may being treated. Gen 4:7 tells us that “….But if you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you must rule over it." It is possible and I am living proof that when I surrender my will to God’s will, I can do things through Christ who gives me the strength to do it. The handy work of God is all around us. But, His crowning and greatest achievement, is in His creation and forming of you and me, and in the end, His finished product will be limited to how much we yield and surrender our lives to His will. What are you allowing God to form in you?

Loving on you today,

Bren