Have you ever stopped and looked at nature. All the plants and animals in this world are very interesting. I stopped on my way home yesterday and took pictures of clouds. The sun was behind a formation. It had an opening and the sun shone through. It was quite striking. I like to look at clouds right before a storm. That is when then are the most beautiful. I talked about the Cherokee Roses on my street. There is an innate beauty about them. You want to guess why? It not because man put fertilizer on them. You know that is what man does a lot in this world. Guess why nature is so beautiful. It is because God created it for Himself and for us. You know that God create all things to share in His life. This includes us. But have you ever considered the Lilies of the field which are beautiful today and thrown into the fire tomorrow. We can’t grow anything by command. We can’t speak to our hair and change the color. We can’t add any years to our lives at all. But God who created all of this can. And He will see to our needs as well for we better than the lilies of the fields. For we are worth more to God than anything. Trust and believe Him.

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What do you believe is the truth? Are you willing to stand up for the truth? Do you have convictions that you will not compromise? Or do you believe in anything at all? Do you know the difference between morals and ethics? Morals are what you believe and trust in. You would not change your mind on the subject for any reason. Ethics change with the situation. They never last and aren’t worth much. Ethical behavior is doing what is right in your eyes. Moral behavior is doing what is right because it is right not convenient. How many people do you know that are willing to stand up for you, even if it cost them their lives. I have searched for just a person all my life. That person is worthy of our loyalty and honor. It seems that people I know have fallen short of this cost. I only found one person on this earth that was worth so much. As the bible says in Romans 5:7-9 “For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.”

There is only one person and His name is Jesus.

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Several years ago, I was teaching first aid for the American Red Cross. I took a basic EMT course to teach their first responder course. After I finished the course, I took the National Medical Board exam for basic EMT. I passed the exam barely. The part I had the hardest time with was signs and symptoms. It is a very important part of the medical field. It is necessary to find out what is wrong with a person. It was one of the hardest courses I have ever taken. But signs and symptoms apply to more than the medical field. It applies to life itself. In this country, there has been a great spiritual revival about every 40 years. The revival is about bringing people back to God. Many of the names of the evangelists in the 20^th century you know. Names like, Aimee Semple McPherson, Kathryn Kuhlman, Billy Graham, Oral Roberts, T.L. Osborn, Morris Cello, Derek Prince, and David Wilkerson. All those revivals occurred because of the decline of Western Civilization. The US is the most evangelized country in the world. And today, it is the most heathen country in the world. Most countries are sending evangelist to the US. The same signs and symptoms of every great civilization’s decline in apparent in the US. It has been 40 years since the last great revival movement. It is time for believers to begin praying again for the move of God. The only other alternative is the fall of our society.

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Before I walked with the Lord, I was not a compassionate person. I believed if you caused it you payed the price. It’s a hard way of looking at things. It also doesn’t generate any love for any one. God began to show me people and their problems. I began to see their needs. I began to have compassion for people. God is moved by compassion. He sees a person in trouble, whether they caused it or not and does something about. People think that they will get out of the consequences of their actions, if God forgives them. Sometimes yes and sometimes no. When we do something it creates consequences that may last forever. I pray fervently that I don’t cause others to suffer my consequences. God is forgiving and will forgive sin if we confess it to Him.  Because of God’s compassion for man, He has moved heaven and earth for us. When Jesus first began preaching in Israel, one of the things He did was healing people. People would come from miles away to ask Jesus to heal them. One day He was at Peter’s house and there hundreds of people trying to see Him. 4 men carrying a litter with a man who had palsy. They couldn’t get into the house. So they went on the roof and torn a hole in it to get the man to Jesus. Jesus was moved by their faith and compassion for the man. At first He said your sins are forgiven, then because of the Pharisees there. He said arise take up your pallet and go home. And he did. It makes no difference who you are or what you have done. Ask and you shall receive, seek and you shall find, knock and it shall be opened for you.

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Everybody remembers the story of Jonah and the whale. Most people don’t talk about why God sent Jonah to Nineveh. This was the capital of the Assyrians. They had raided into Israel and had killed whoever they saw, men, women and children. God wanted to give the Ninevites the opportunity to repent of the sins. Otherwise God was going to destroy Nineveh. Jonah said let them all die. Then Jonah ran from God. Boarded a ship bound for wherever. There arose a storm until they all believe they would die. They asked everybody what they could do to stop this. Jonah said God was angry with him. They needed to throw him overboard. Finally they did. The Whale swallowed Jonah. He was in the belly of the whale for three days and nights. Until Jonah repented. He went to Nineveh. He preached repentance and 100,000 people repented of their sins. Jonah became angry with God. He wanted revenge, but God wanted life. What do you see in this story? Do you understand what it is all about? It is the story of our life. It is what God will do to bring us to repentance. God doesn’t want revenge. He is willing to send someone to you to help you. Hear what God is saying to you. Just as it was in the days of Jonah, God sent Jesus into hell for three days and nights for us.

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After a forest fire in the 1950’s, forest fire fighters found a bear cub up in a tree. The cub survived the fire barely. He had climbed in the tree to escape the fire. It was badly burned but survived. The little bear recovered from his wounds and eventually ended up in the National Zoo in Washington D.C. They named the bear Smokey. The US Forest Service took the bear as mascot. They began an advertisement campaign to prevent forest fires. And in all the commercials Smokey the bear would say, only you can prevent forest fires. Because of the large amount of fires recently in the western US, they have revived the Smokey the bear commercials. This time he says, only you can prevent wildfires. Yet I know people that start fires daily just by what they say. The unfortunate thing about that is that they can’t take it back. A person asked how they could take back what they said. The answer was take a small box of feathers to a mountain top and release them in the wind. Then go and get all the feathers back in the box. It is impossible. And the damage can stay for years.

Jas 1:26 (KJV) If any man among you seem to be religious, and bridleth not his tongue, but deceiveth his own heart, this man’s religion is vain.

Jas 3:5-6 (KJV) Even so the tongue is a little member, and boasteth great things. Behold, how great a matter a little fire kindleth! And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity: so is the tongue among our members, that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire of hell.

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When Jesus came to earth as a man, he knew that God had a plan for his life. Jesus lived a normal life in Israel. He became a Pharisee, Rabbi. Jesus taught the people as well as his disciples how to live and what to expect from God. This was nothing new, he just explained the Law to everyone. Jesus knew that he was going to die for our sins. He trusted God to bring to pass his will on earth. God raised Jesus from the dead to make him King of Kings and Lord of Lords. But Jesus’ job wasn’t through. There were final instructions for the disciples. Jesus told the disciple that when He ascended into heaven God was going to send the Holy Spirit to live inside of us. We would become kings and priest, prophets to God. He told them to wait for the Holy Spirit. So in the upper room, 120 disciples waited and prayed. The Holy Spirit came down and filled each person in that room. There was so much noise that people outside came to see what was going on. There were at less 3000 people gathered. They heard something they never heard before. The disciples were speaking in tongues, in a heavenly language. They also heard these disciples speak all the different languages of the world. For they were baptized in the Holy Spirit, just as God had promised on the Day of Pentecost.

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I am not talking about the religious denomination. I am talking about the movement of God. The first reference to it in the bible was about King Saul chasing David. Saul was so close to catching David, God had to intervene. The Holy Spirit came upon Saul. He was filled with the Holy Spirit and began to prophesy and speak in other tongues. His men asked if Saul was one of the prophets. It stopped Saul long enough for David to escape. So, the prophets of God were, first, filled with the Holy Spirit. Second, their lives changed and everyone saw it. Third, the prophets of God prophesied and spoke in other tongues. Not everyone was able to receive this, because the Holy Spirit was only given to everyone after Jesus died and rose again. When Jesus rose into heaven on the day of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit came down and filled everyone in the upper room. All the people in Israel that saw and heard this and knew what had happened. They knew because there hadn’t been a prophet in Israel for 400 years. The people perceived that these ordinary people had received from the Spirit of God. It is said that over 3000 people believed on Jesus that day. Pentecostalism, the baptism of the Holy Spirit, speaking in other tongues, is the power of God in our lives. This is the power to accomplish God’s will on this earth. Just like on the day of Pentecost, it is for every believer who ask for it.

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Years ago I worked in Real Estate. I sold property but mostly did Appraisals. There was a friend of my younger brother who wanted to buy a piece of property to build a house. I found a nice piece in the country on a lake. It was a very nice piece of land. He had been in the US Army and was going to use the VA to build his home. The VA turned him down because I made a mistake. The property was a gated community. It had a locked gate at the entrance. He had spent his life saving on the property. He wouldn’t speak to me. One Sunday morning I was on my way to church and the Lord spoke to me. He said go to this man and asked for forgiveness. He wouldn’t hear of forgiveness and cursed me. I had done what the Lord had said. I prayer that the situation would be corrected. God helped him sell the property for more money. The bible says if you are bringing a gift to God and remember that your brother has ought against you. Leave the gift and go to your brother and be reconciled. We are responsible for our actions. If they caused our brother to stumble it is our job to fix it as best we can. God will do the rest.

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There is a John Steinbeck short story called “Flight”. A young man kills a man and flees for his life. They chased him to the top of a hill. There he knew he had to face the truth. He stood up and the police shot him dead. The tragic story is about taking courage even though it may kill you. We are placed on this earth to prove the truth that we are the image and likeness of God. We walk in this world trying to figure out what is the best way to live our lives. Not everyone succeeds. The only way we can possibly live this life is by taking courage. Our parents tried to teach us how to live the right way. They wanted the best for us. When I was a teenager, I thought my parents were brain dead. As I got older, I saw the wisdom of my parents. My dad died 31 years ago. For the longest time after his death, I heard my father’s voice. Whenever I had a problem, I could hear inside me my father’s voice giving me wisdom. As I discovered my father wasn’t as stupid as I thought. That wisdom always gave me courage to face whatever I needed to. And I would take courage and face life as I am supposed to.

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