For many years now, I have seen what my fate is to be coming clearer and clearer before my eyes. I did not want to accept it. I knew what it was supposed to be and yet I resisted.
I cannot point to any given thing that has emphatically told me in precise words that this is my fate. Yet it seems to me that God has always spoken to me through many outlets such as His Word, Pastors, Evangelists, other Christians, Non-Christians, even animals and the very things that make up Nature! They have all pointed to me and told me what my fate will be. And yet still I resisted.
So I lived the life of a sinner. A Liar, Adulterer, Blasphemer, Drug Dealer, Thief, Slanderer and many, many other sinful things was I. Those of you that know me, know some of those things about me. Those of you who do not know me, you are more than welcome to go through my blogs on here and find out what you may.
I bet many of you are curious as to what that fate actually is. Well, I'll tell you. My fate, as I know it to be, is to give my very life for Jesus Christ! I'm not talking about living it to Jesus. I'm talking about standing up against all that is against Jesus and speaking the Truth about Jesus, not giving a single inch in my stand, and having my life taken because of it! The life in this very body extinguished! I know this to be a fact that will happen. Again, I cannot point to any one thing that has told me this, but I know it to be a fact none the less. I take it on faith. The faith I have in God, in Jesus, in the Word of God to accomplish that which I have been told is to come.
I surrender to my fate completely! I surrender myself and the very breath of my life to this fate knowing that God's Will will be furthered along with my last breath! I surrender it into your hands my Lord and Savior, into your hands Jesus Christ, into your hands Lord God Almighty!
I know that I may not die tonight. I know that I may not die tomorrow. I know it may not happen next month or next year. I simply know it will happen. But then, it has already happened in one sense as well. The sense that I had to die to all that I desire in my life in order to accept all that God wants for me in my life.
I had to come to realize that my life was nothing but vanity. I had good looks once. I had a fit body also. I had brains. I had a good job. I had a loving wife. I had great friends. Then God showed my the truth about my life. He let me ruin myself in order to show me that my life was nothing but vanity and even that which I did have, I could lose through my vanity. I lost my good looks. I lost my fit body. I even lost my ability to think clearly. I was without a job. My wife divorced me. My friends no longer talked to me. I had even lost my will to live. I truthfully did not think of any reason to go on living. The thing is, the more I thought about what I had lost, the harder I tried to find just one reason to live. I failed in that quest!
God was with me even then as well. He had never left me. I just had turned away from Him and was ignoring His attempts to get me to turn around and see Him once again. I came to the end of myself. When I mean the end, I mean there was nothing left of me. All that I had valued and cherished that I had accomplished through all my efforts was gone. I no longer had any reason to go on living.
I prayed that I would die! It hurts me even now to admit that. But I prayed and prayed and prayed that God would snuff out my life so that I would not feel the pain of all that loss any more. He heard me. He heard what I was praying for and He answered me. He took my life. I willingly surrendered it to Him. Then He said, 'Not yet!' and He started to transform me. He restored my intellect. He restored my friends. He restored my faith in Him. He took this ruined husk of a shell and He poured Himself into it and started transforming me into an image of His Son, Jesus Christ. I am far from complete. But He is still pouring Himself into me. He keeps pouring and pouring and pouring.
As I now live His life, not mine anymore but His, I find that all those things that I thought I had accomplished of my own will, they were never mine to begin with, but His! And now He is putting them back into my stewardship and guiding me on how to care for them. I can't tell you how much He has restored to me. My life has meaning again. But then, it's not my life anymore, but His!
The Jay that all of you knew from before is dead! The Jay that lives now is not the former Jay, but instead, Jay is the Jay that Jesus has made. This new Jay lives for the sole purpose of doing the Will of Jesus Christ. And the best part of all you ask? The best part is that my life is better than it ever has been before! I cannot tell you of the joy and peace and everything that comes from Him.
I wish for each and every one of you to know Him like I know Him! Do you live for yourself? Do you live for someone else other than Jesus? If you do, then stop and die because the life you are living is dead anyway. Go talk to Jesus! Right here. Right now. Ask my Lord to be your Lord. He will never leave you. He will never forsake you. And all those people who you were formerly living for, they will be better off with you having Jesus Christ as your Lord and them being second in your life instead of first. They will know joy and peace like never before.
Yet I still know that the death of this body is to come. I even know that this body will die in defiance against something that will be assailing me for the sole reason that I have Jesus Christ as my Lord. When that will be I do not care. I do not care if it happens tonight. I do not care if it happens thirty years from now. The only thing I do care about is that I give it willingly for Jesus!
May my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, reach out and touch your heart this very moment and let you know that He loves you!
Amen and Amen!
27 November 2010
08 November 2010
Can you go too far?
Hello Guys and Gals!
For most of my adult life, I was a hedonist. I did things simply for my pleasure and that was my motivation for doing anything. During this time, God was working on me. He called me to follow Him completely and I never did. Even my own family and friends kept telling me I needed to grow up and start taking responsibility for my life. I was told time and again that I needed to be a man and correct the bad things in my life, you know, grow up!
Now that I have committed myself to God completely in all that I do, and I'm speaking His Word, spreading the Gospel, and standing up for the Truth, relying on His strength for my integrity, I ask the question, 'Have I gone too far?'! Can you go too far in following Him? Is what I now am distasteful to others because I follow Him so completely? Now I'm not saying that I'm perfect or even close to it, but I am committed to Him and doing His will in my life and the lives of others. But have I gone too far?
I remember posting about how if I lost everything, including family and friends, and if I still have Jesus, then I have the world and more because He is all I need! Well, I believe now that He tested me in this. When I have a confrontation with my brother, I was tested in how I would react. I did the right thing and stayed calm. When my brother got violent, I called the police and let them handle it. During this event and the following conversations with my family, I learned that my brother lied to my family about many things concerning that event. He has also told many others that he will catch up with me one day and then the score will be settled. I spoke the truth to my family, the police, the District Attorney, and even the Judge on the stand at court. Yet my brother has bragged to people that my family has essentially disowned me and how pleased he is by that. My family says they haven't, yet none of them call me. The only one who does is my mother every couple of months or so.
I stood up for the truth and did not lie even about how I was feeling during the time of the event and after. I was called a liar by many in my family. This hurt me very much. Even now I can feel the pain of it all. I had to tell my mother that so long as my brother intends to do me harm, that I will have nothing to do with either him or anyone else who associates with him in any way. This was very difficult for me to do. But then, there was only my mother calling me at that time anyway. I fear that my brother will somehow find a way to find out where I now live and other ways to cause me harm.
But through it all, every single second of it, Jesus stood by my side and gave me His strength to handle this trial I am going through right now. Jesus lets me know every single day that He is by my side as I struggle with everything that I am struggling with. Even through all of this, my life has improved. My health is getting better, even if it's doing so slowly. My finances are improving. My home life with my friend Corey is awesome. He's one of the best friends I have ever had. And even my devoted time to Jesus and His Word has improved by so much it cannot be measured.
But again, let me ask, did I go too far? I don't think I did! I am relying on God more than ever before and He has proven Himself to be faithful again and again...oh yeah, even again after that! Jesus, you are my true Lord and I happily get down on my knees before you every morning. You are my savior and I am forever thankful that you loved a wretch like me enough to pull me out of the hell I was living in and restore to me all that You have. You are my God and I will forever praise you saying, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty!
Here is the whole point of this post, you can never go too far when you're going towards Jesus! The simple truth is, no matter how far you do go, He is always with you and encouraging you to come even closer to Him. Even when I am living in His holy city, being every day in His presence for ten thousand years, He will still be challenging me to come even closer to Him! I love him so much that my heart literally aches at the thought of being able to walk up to Him and fall to my knees before Him and thank Him for being Him!
If you feel that Jesus is challenging you to come closer to Him, then take up that challenge and see what He has in store for you. Yes, I am still struggling with this issue in my life and I pray daily for restoration of my family, but just having Jesus is still more than enough for me! I pray that you also find this kind of relationship with Him in your life as well!
May God give each and every one of you a special blessing this day!
For most of my adult life, I was a hedonist. I did things simply for my pleasure and that was my motivation for doing anything. During this time, God was working on me. He called me to follow Him completely and I never did. Even my own family and friends kept telling me I needed to grow up and start taking responsibility for my life. I was told time and again that I needed to be a man and correct the bad things in my life, you know, grow up!
Now that I have committed myself to God completely in all that I do, and I'm speaking His Word, spreading the Gospel, and standing up for the Truth, relying on His strength for my integrity, I ask the question, 'Have I gone too far?'! Can you go too far in following Him? Is what I now am distasteful to others because I follow Him so completely? Now I'm not saying that I'm perfect or even close to it, but I am committed to Him and doing His will in my life and the lives of others. But have I gone too far?
I remember posting about how if I lost everything, including family and friends, and if I still have Jesus, then I have the world and more because He is all I need! Well, I believe now that He tested me in this. When I have a confrontation with my brother, I was tested in how I would react. I did the right thing and stayed calm. When my brother got violent, I called the police and let them handle it. During this event and the following conversations with my family, I learned that my brother lied to my family about many things concerning that event. He has also told many others that he will catch up with me one day and then the score will be settled. I spoke the truth to my family, the police, the District Attorney, and even the Judge on the stand at court. Yet my brother has bragged to people that my family has essentially disowned me and how pleased he is by that. My family says they haven't, yet none of them call me. The only one who does is my mother every couple of months or so.
I stood up for the truth and did not lie even about how I was feeling during the time of the event and after. I was called a liar by many in my family. This hurt me very much. Even now I can feel the pain of it all. I had to tell my mother that so long as my brother intends to do me harm, that I will have nothing to do with either him or anyone else who associates with him in any way. This was very difficult for me to do. But then, there was only my mother calling me at that time anyway. I fear that my brother will somehow find a way to find out where I now live and other ways to cause me harm.
But through it all, every single second of it, Jesus stood by my side and gave me His strength to handle this trial I am going through right now. Jesus lets me know every single day that He is by my side as I struggle with everything that I am struggling with. Even through all of this, my life has improved. My health is getting better, even if it's doing so slowly. My finances are improving. My home life with my friend Corey is awesome. He's one of the best friends I have ever had. And even my devoted time to Jesus and His Word has improved by so much it cannot be measured.
But again, let me ask, did I go too far? I don't think I did! I am relying on God more than ever before and He has proven Himself to be faithful again and again...oh yeah, even again after that! Jesus, you are my true Lord and I happily get down on my knees before you every morning. You are my savior and I am forever thankful that you loved a wretch like me enough to pull me out of the hell I was living in and restore to me all that You have. You are my God and I will forever praise you saying, Holy, Holy, Holy is the Lord God Almighty!
Here is the whole point of this post, you can never go too far when you're going towards Jesus! The simple truth is, no matter how far you do go, He is always with you and encouraging you to come even closer to Him. Even when I am living in His holy city, being every day in His presence for ten thousand years, He will still be challenging me to come even closer to Him! I love him so much that my heart literally aches at the thought of being able to walk up to Him and fall to my knees before Him and thank Him for being Him!
If you feel that Jesus is challenging you to come closer to Him, then take up that challenge and see what He has in store for you. Yes, I am still struggling with this issue in my life and I pray daily for restoration of my family, but just having Jesus is still more than enough for me! I pray that you also find this kind of relationship with Him in your life as well!
May God give each and every one of you a special blessing this day!
01 November 2010
I Still Have Jesus!
Hello Guys and Gals!
I have been thinking about what if I lost something. It has been mulling over in my mind for a while now. One of the things that I hold most dear is the knowledge I have. My intelligentcia if you will. But what would I feel like if I lost my ability to think clearly? To analyze? To even understand?
Well, I have come to a conclusion about this. If I lose everything, my intelligence, my health, my ability to walk, to talk, to process thoughts, if I lose it all and I still have Jesus, whom by the way can never be taken from me, then I have still won! I win salvation which is a free gift from God through my faith in His Son, Jesus Christ. This means that I will never suffer of the Second Death which is the death of the soul. I will never be cast into Gehenna, the Lake of Fire. I will never know what total separation from God is. And this means I win life eternal with Him!
Thank you Jesus, my Lord, my Savior, my God, and my friend! I love you!
If you do not have this kind of a relationship with Jesus Christ, and you would like to know God personally as I do, please contact me here, by e-mail, by phone, or just come over and talk to me. I will not judge you. I have probably done worse than you could ever do. If Jesus can save me, then He certainly can save you as well. God loves you! Jesus loves you! He wants you to have eternal life and even better life than what you are now experiencing. He wants to give it to you freely. You only have to reach out to Him and ask Him to come into your heart. You can do this alone, or with someone else, or with me. Either way, or whatever you do decide to do, please seek to find out what God wants for you.
I love all of you guys! God bless you this day!
I have been thinking about what if I lost something. It has been mulling over in my mind for a while now. One of the things that I hold most dear is the knowledge I have. My intelligentcia if you will. But what would I feel like if I lost my ability to think clearly? To analyze? To even understand?
Well, I have come to a conclusion about this. If I lose everything, my intelligence, my health, my ability to walk, to talk, to process thoughts, if I lose it all and I still have Jesus, whom by the way can never be taken from me, then I have still won! I win salvation which is a free gift from God through my faith in His Son, Jesus Christ. This means that I will never suffer of the Second Death which is the death of the soul. I will never be cast into Gehenna, the Lake of Fire. I will never know what total separation from God is. And this means I win life eternal with Him!
Thank you Jesus, my Lord, my Savior, my God, and my friend! I love you!
If you do not have this kind of a relationship with Jesus Christ, and you would like to know God personally as I do, please contact me here, by e-mail, by phone, or just come over and talk to me. I will not judge you. I have probably done worse than you could ever do. If Jesus can save me, then He certainly can save you as well. God loves you! Jesus loves you! He wants you to have eternal life and even better life than what you are now experiencing. He wants to give it to you freely. You only have to reach out to Him and ask Him to come into your heart. You can do this alone, or with someone else, or with me. Either way, or whatever you do decide to do, please seek to find out what God wants for you.
I love all of you guys! God bless you this day!
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