Interesting Articles & Family Vacation

So I have read a few interesting articles lately and wanted to share them with you! :) Also have some pictures from my parents visiting for 5 days, just wish they would have been here another few days! :( Al Mohler talks about respecting other religions here. An article about a Chinese Christian suffering persecution here. An article about the Taliban & Pink Boxer Shorts here. :) HILARIOUS! :) Pictures from my parents visiting Jenny & I this last weekend here! :)

GOOD FRIDAY! :)

Here are a couple of things I've come across from friends that were interesting that add a little bit to the crucifixion...I'm not positive they are true...but nonetheless interesting! :)

Why Did Jesus Fold the Napkin? Why did Jesus fold the linen burial cloth after His resurrection? I never noticed this.... The Gospel of John (20:7) tells us that the napkin, which was placed over the face of Jesus, was not just thrown aside like the grave clothes. The Bible takes an entire verse to tell us that the napkin was neatly folded, and was placed at the head of that stony coffin. Early Sunday morning, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and found that the stone had been rolled away from the entrance. She ran and found Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved. She said, 'They have taken the Lord's body out of the tomb, and I don't know where they have put him!' Peter and the other disciple ran to the tomb to see. The other disciple outran Peter and got there first. He stooped and looked in and saw the linen cloth lying there, but he didn't go in. Then Simon Peter arrived and went inside. He also noticed the linenwrappings lying there, while the cloth that had covered Jesus' head was folded up and lying to the side. Was that important? Absolutely! In order to understand the significance of the folded napkin, you have tounderstand a little bit about Hebrew tradition of that day. The folded napkin had to do with the Master and Servant, and every Jewish boy knew this tradition. When the servant set the dinner table for the master, he made sure that it was exactly the way the master wanted it. The table was furnished perfectly, and then the servant would wait, just out of sight, until the master had finished eating, and the servant would not dare touch that table, until the master was finished. Now if the master were done eating, he would rise from the table, wipe his fingers, his mouth, and clean his beard, and would wad up that napkin and toss it onto the table. The servant would then know to clear the table. For in those days, the wadded napkin meant, 'I'm done'. But if the master got up from the table, and folded his napkin, and laid it beside his plate, the servant would not dare touch the table, because.......... The folded napkin meant, 'I'm coming back!'

The Sign on the Cross!

Since you and I and most Christians aren't Jews, we often run the risk of missing the point when it comes to a lot of "cultural" or "language" issues in the scripture. This is why it is very important to take a close look at exactly what is going on anytime the Pharisees or the Jewish crowd get upset over something related to Jesus. In this particular case, there was a very big reason that the Pharisees wanted the sign changed. In the Hebrew, the sign read as follows:

ישוע הנצרי ומלך היהודים

Keep in mind that Hebrew reads from right to left...I highlighted the first letter of each word red. This phrase transliterates as "Yeshua Hanozri Wumelech Haiehudim" as I titled the e-mail. The ancient Jews were very aware of acrostics...they were used extensively. In this particular case, the acrostic is YHWH...the unpronouncible name of God. We would pronounce it "Jehovah." This sign was declaring Jesus to be God! I'm not saying that Pilate truly believed that when he wrote this, but he would have known full well that it would upset the Pharisees. Praise Him for what He did today...but not just today! Live your life everyday in remembrance Jesus on the cross for your sin and for mine! :)

BABY(ies)!!!!!!

So Jenny and I have been keeping a secret about the baby from our friends and even family! We aren't just having 1 baby boy....we are having three! :) :) Surprise! APRIL FOOL'S DAY! :)

Life

So yesterday was a great reminder to me about how fragile & wonderful, temporary & amazing, taken for granted and cherished. In a few hours last night I went from feeling my baby kick in the womb for the 1st time (21 weeks) to counseling a widow and her daughter an hour after their husband/father passed away in the night. I went from feeling the beginning of life's stages and observing a baby just beginning to move to observing a man who's life had just ended an hour before. There are no words to describe either situation, the joy and elation of feeling your 1st baby move or the sadness of comforting someone who lost their husband/father of 33 years. My mind brought me continually back to the passage in Eccl. where it says "there is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under heaven, a time to be born and a time to die..." (Eccl. 3:1-2). We do not know when those times to die will come, but we should be prepared to face the Creator of Life and we need to be doing everything we can to help our friends, neighbors and even strangers be prepared as well to face the Creator of Life. If we are born of God then our lives truly only begin when we die to ourselves and begin to live for Him...how much more so when we die physically in order to experience joy everlasting with our Heavenly Father who has given us NEW life through His Son!

Bible Reading

I started a Bible Reading plan over a month ago and have been talking about it with some friends and students at Majestic but wanted to share it with a "bigger" audience. One of my professors in college (who also happened to teach Sunday morning Bible Study I went to as well) recently posted on Facebook (here and PDF format here)the plan he has been using for over 20 years for his personal Bible Reading. He knew God's word better than just about everyone I knew and I figured it was just because he smarter and older than I was...he points to this plan and God's grace as the reason he knows his Bible so well. I encourage you to at least look at it and be challenged as I was to know God better through His word. This is a GREAT use of 10 minutes!!!!!!!!!! JKE PS. There were less than 300 people in the group when I joined...there are now over 2500 people! :)

Baby Update

So these "pictures" were taken a month ago...sorry for not posting them sooner! It is looking like the baby will be a boy...like 99% chance! :) :) :)

You can see he is already praying! :) :) :) :)

Pursuing Holiness

This is the lesson I taught Sunday night at youth group....the quotes are from Jerry Bridges' book "The Pursuit of Holiness" (Colorado Springs: Navpress, 1978). I highly recommend reading! Some of the ideas are his too...

1 Thess. 4:7 “For God did not call us to uncleanness, but in holiness.”

Gal. 2:20 “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.”

Living by faith…what does it mean? Who’s living? Who are we putting our trust in? Are our lives completely up to God? Who chose to brush or not brush you teeth today? Who chose or didn’t choose to read their Bible today?

“We have a personal responsibility for our walk of holiness.” Holiness isn’t just God’s job…it’s ours too!

Most of us have decided that some sins are worth committing even though we know it is sin! A certain TV show, listening to certain songs, trying to impress that certain someone by actions or looks, spending hours on our physical bodies (makeup or working out) and minutes on our spiritual bodies, etc!

God’s holiness is the absolute absence of sin! He can’t even tolerate the smallest most insignificant sin in our lives because He is that holy!

We are made holy in our standing before God through Christ, but we are called to be holy in our daily lives! “If there is not at least a yearning in our hearts to live a holy live pleasing to God then you need to seriously question whether your faith in Jesus Christ is genuine…because true salvation brings a desire to be holy.”

God doesn’t require a perfect, sinless life to have fellowship with Him, but He does require us to be serious about holiness and about confessing, grieving and repenting from our sin.

Romans 6:6-7 “that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin. 7 For he who has died has been freed from sin.”

But why do we still continue to sin??? Because we have formed many habits of sin that we haven’t worked hard enough at removing from our lives! We simply choose to keep sinning instead of living righteously…even though we have the ability not to sin.

We have the responsibility to resist sin, but “to confuse the responsibility of resisting with the potential for resisting is to court disaster in the pursuit of holiness.”

“Holiness is not a series of do’s and don’ts, but conformity to the character of God and obedience to the will of God. Accepting with contentment whatever circumstances God allows for me is very much a part a holy walk.”

SO WHAT ARE SOME WAYS TO LIVE IN HOLINESS???

Col. 1:11-14 “strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power, for all patience and longsuffering with joy; 12 giving thanks to the Father who has qualified us to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in the light. 13 He has delivered us from the power of darkness and conveyed us into the kingdom of the Son of His love, 14 in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins.”

1) Remember who you belong to and who we look to for help!

We are supposed to be strengthened with God's might, according to His power because "He has delivered us from the power of darkness" but if we continue to sin we are walking back into darkness instead of into the light. Unless we remain faithful, we cannot experience His power & strength the way God intended for us to experience as "saints in the light."

On my own, my best is nothing but filthy rags (Is. 64:6), but in Christ, I have His glorious power because I have been delivered from darkness "through His blood."

Col. 3:5 “Put to death, therefore, whatever belongs to your earthly nature: sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry.”

“Put to death” means to "destroy the strength, vitality, or functioning of!" Don't let sin breathe, grow stronger or have any influence whatsoever in your life!

But in order to do this we must 2) form conviction!

This means that you don't allow the smallest sin to influence your life. When something is sinful you refrain from it, no matter how insignificant it may seem. When something is holy, you go after it...not just casually, but passionately! Your convictions are based upon what scripture says and you follow it...despite your feelings trying to convince you otherwise.

Ps. 119:11 “I have hidden Your word in my heart that I might not sin against You.”

3) Hide God’s word in our hearts!

“God’s word must be so strongly fixed in our minds that it becomes the dominant influence in our thoughts, our attitudes, and our actions.”

What are ways we can make that happen? Reading God's word, memorizing God's word, talking about God's word, meditating on God's word, praying to God, think about it all day long.

“Everytime we say yes to temptation, we make it harder to say no the next time.”

1 Thess. 4:3 “It is God’s will that you abstain from sexual immorality.”

4) Refrain from sexually immorality!

Not just from having sex, but everything that leads up to sex! If holding hands makes you think impurely about someone, then STOP! Going beyond that is just wrong…are you touching someone inappropriately? HUGS, making out, it leads to sex and if you don’t believe me then you are either extremely prideful, ignorant or just don’t care. And that is a dangerous place to be. (Pr. 6:27-28)

"By the age of 24, 89 percent of males and 92 percent of females have had intercourse" (Here). ….be part of that small percentage!!!!

Job 31:1 “I made a covenant with my eyes not to look lustfully at a girl.”

Ps. 19:14 “Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O LORD, my strength and my Redeemer.”

5) Make a covenant with your eyes, ears, mouths & hearts...not to take part in sin or even temptation!

We have to be willing to obey and submit to God…even if we don’t want to!

Col. 4:2 “Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.”

6) Be devoted to prayer!

Until you make a firm and resolved commitment to live for holiness without exceptions, you will continue to live in a pattern of sin! Until you are willing to let go of the fun, enjoyable, or popular things in your life that disgrace our holy and perfect God, you can’t win the battle even though you have every ability to win through the power of God!

How to know right from wrong? (Pg. 88)

1. “‘Everything is permissible for me’ but not everything is beneficial” (1 Cor. 6:12) Is it helpful – physically, spiritually and mentally?

2. “‘Everything is permissible for me’ but I will not be mastered by anything” (1 Cor. 6:12) Does it bring me under its power?

3. “Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause him to fall.” (1 Cor. 8:13) Does it hurt others?

4. “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” (1 Cor. 10:31) Does it glorify God?

“It may not be the activity itself that determines whether something is sinful for us, but rather our response to that activity.”

Romans 12:1-2 “I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.”

My goal for the student is that they are transformed into God’s image by His mercy and grace!

Some questions I thought of to help me and others evaluate the things in my life...

Is what I spend my time doing for myself or for others?

Is what I spend my time doing going to have a positive impact on my life? Other people’s lives?

Is what I spend my time doing going to have an eternal impact?

Is what I spend my time doing a reflection of my relationship with God?

Is what I spend my time doing obedience or disobedience to God and His commands?

Is what I spend my time doing helping my walk with God or hindering it?

Is what I spend my time doing an example of something others should do as well?

Is what I spend my time doing give the credit and honor and glory to God or myself?

1) Remember who you belong to! Christ! Col. 1:11-14

2) Form conviction! Col. 3:5

3) Hide God’s word in our hearts! Ps. 119:11

4) Refrain from sexually immorality! 1 Thess. 4:3

5) Make a covenant with your eyes, ears, mouths & hearts. Job 31:1, Ps. 19:14

6) Be devoted to prayer! Col. 4:2

Ephesians 3:20-21 "Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen."