Justified or Incarcerated

"'Go up to a land flowing with milk and honey; but I will not go up among you, lest I consume you on the way, for you are a stiff-necked people.' When the people heard this disastrous word, they mourned, and no one put on his ornaments. For the Lord had said to Moses, 'Say to the people of Israel, 'You are a stiff-necked people; if for a single moment I should go up among you, I would consume you. So now take off your ornaments, that I may know what to do with you.' Therefore the people of Israel stripped themselves of their ornaments, from Mount Horeb onward." (Exodus 33:3-6) First, God knows the people heart; therefore, He knows if he goes with Israel, he will destroy them with in a single moment.  The problem was in their hearts.  The word that God used to describe these people is "stiff-neck." We all known what happens if the person has a stiff neck, he can't turn his head right to left, the neck is stiff.  That's how God describe...

"All the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of Sin by stages, according to the commandment of the Lord, and camped at Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. 2Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, "Give us water to drink." And Moses said to them, "Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?" 3But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, "Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?" (Exodus 17:1-3) All of us face disappointments, they very and different from each other.  Do to the context of our lives, for example if the person is single, married, divorce, in jail, work as a police officer will experience disappointments in one area or another.  But what all disappointments have in common is the reaction of the person.  Ether the person submits to the situation and goes on thankful...

http://wallpaperscristaos.com.br/christianwallpapers/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/faith-God-wallpaper_1920x1200.jpg Previously we answered the question that  defines faith .  We said faith is a positive response towards truths which we humans can't see.  Right away we can say, hold on, how do we know what to believe?  Someone down the street can come up and speak things that would not be rational and you want to say this is true?  But even if it was rational, does it still make it true thats the question.  It all depends on the object of faith. Today, we have around 730 religions that are established which broken down to 3200 different sects according to  wiki  answers all describing the object of faith.  It is even possible for a person to read scrolls that spoke of God and still believe in a false god.  Jesus speaks to people who were masters of the Old Testament, but still fell short in seeing the real truth....

Most of Americans where shocked seeing the tragedy of Connecticut shooting.  20 children among 26 victims were pronounced dead at the scene.  It grieves me just writing about this.  Today, four firefighters responded to a fire outside Rochester, NY.  At the scene all four were shot by a gunman, only two were pronounced dead.  Also today, in Houston, a police officer was killed by just doing his job.  Men who serve the people by people are being targeted.  There was another man who came to serve two thousand years ago, but by his own people was murdered.  His name is Jesus Christ.  "He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him." (John 1:11).  It looks like people have hard time receiving help when they really need it. http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/police-officer-fatally-shot-houston-18057335#.UNjJWqWiwiU http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/firefighter-shot-at-scene-of-blaze-in-western-ny-2-homes-burn...

http://wallpaperscristaos.com.br/christianwallpapers/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/faith-God-wallpaper_1920x1200.jpg “Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen"—Heb 11:1 Friend of mine recently asked me what I knew about faith.  Right away I made an attempt explaining him faith since I’ve been a Christian for few years now.  After a long discussion, we both decided to study faith and get back to this topic.  Faith is a word often heard in churches; when reading the Bible, just in New Testament we find 243 verses that mention the word faith.  When I began reading all these verses and thinking about them, I understood that I had little knowledge of faith.  Faith is a general and practical topic in Christianity, but I knew little about it.  So the question I want to ask is this: what is faith? Studying the scripture, the best description we find is in Hebrews chapter eleven verse one: “Now faith i...

Today me and my wife (Ira) are celebrating our first year marriage anniversary.  What a year! God has been so gracious towards two of us in brining us together in this world.  So I decided to share what I faced being a husband during my first year of marriage.     Before I continue writing my experience, I want to say that I am not a perfect husband (it's hard to know this unless you are my wife), but everyday I find my self in need of God's grace to be that husband.  I rely not on my ability to reason and lead, but I rely on the scripture and it's ability to lead me where God want's me to be.  In the humblest way, there are great man who love God and their wives, and I am honored to learn from them towards how to be a godly husband.   In my fist year being a husband, I found myself being challenged in three areas: I was a man who needed to understand my wife, know where to lead our family, and show genuine care towards her.  I tell ever...

Trusting in God's Sovereignty – Grace Bible Church You can get more sermons here:   http://www.monergism.com/directory/link_category/Audio-and-Multimedia/Speakers-Lectures-and-Sermons/Jerry-Bridges/

Four reasons why I think the men's hiking was a blessing to our church.  Since God calls men to lead, the men's hike contribute towards the biblical understanding in who is a man. Here's my reasons: Leader who trusts God One of the events that we had at this men's hike was to look at the life of Joseph.  We observed how Joseph was sold to slavery by his brothers, how he was slandered by Potiphar's wife.  But through his life, even the circumstances that were unpleasant and hurtful, he remained trusting and fearing God.  Joseph, looked at the evilness of his brothers and saw the good in it.  "As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today" (Genesis 50:20).  For the man to lead, he needs to put his trust in God and live the life to the fullest no matter how others treat him, no matter how different are the circumstances—a thought that was in my m...

Now the whole earth had one language and the same words.  And as people migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there.  And they said to one another, “Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.”  And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar.  Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be dispersed over the face of the whole earth.”  And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of man had built. And the LORD said, “Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language, and this is only the beginning of what they will do. And nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them.  Come, let us go down and there confuse their language, so that they may not understand one another's speech.”  So the LORD dispersed them from there over the face of all the e...

The thing about the piano guys is that they don't only play good music, but they bring as much emotions and the art of performing to the viewers.  There use to be time that the only way to hear music is only go watch someone play the instrument.  Phonograph and radio invention brought music from theaters to peoples home, then tape player, then cd player, the music switched from live performance to the speakers.  Even these days, from an iPad people can perform a music piece, just using technology.  The live music performance slowly faded away.  The Piano Guys brought not only the professional skills, but also emotions and the art that the song brings.  The refreshing scenes and the performance really come together beautifully.  I haven't seen anyone do that good of a job as these guys—a hard work blesses others. Proverbs says, "The soul of the sluggard craves and gets nothing...

http://honeyandlocusts.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/pointing-finger.jpg Discipleship leads towards a healthy life before God. Recently, one of my friends asked me about how to work with a person who has a pattern of expressing cold, critical, judgmental, and defensive responds when confronted with corrections. Eventually, the cold, critical, judgmental and defensive behavior at the end of the day only hurting the person who acts this way. Discipleship is not focused on cultivating friendship, which friendship plays a roll, but on sharpening the areas that are sinful, unhealthy, and destructive for the soul. Proverbs says, "A rebuke goes deeper into a man of understanding than a hundred blows into a fool" (17:10). Another words, Proverbs says there are two people at the end of those who are rebuke, a person who understands and a person who is a fool, (none of us reading this, think ourselves as a fool, but do we accept the rebuke from others?). Fool can hear hundred...

"Then Noah built an altar to the LORD and took some of every clean animal and some of every clean bird and offered burnt offerings on the altar.  And when the LORD smelled the pleasing aroma, the LORD said in his heart, “I will never again curse the ground because of man, for the intention of man's heart is evil from his youth . Neither will I ever again strike down every living creature as I have done.  While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.” (Genesis 8:20-22) The whole earth was under the flood because men was wicked.  The intention of men's thoughts were only evil continually; therefore, every creature that took a breathed and was not on the ark, died.  God's continuing mercy prevailed men's continuing evil.  God kept life on earth through Noah and by stating that the major flood will never be repeat.  At some point, his continuing mercy will only have to stop a...

http://www.teenjury.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/freedom-of-speech.jpg What is marriage? A debatable question between a religious groups and homosexuals.  A biblical view on marriage is when a man and a women (opposite sex) become a husband and a wife consensual and contractual recognized by a law.  Where, the culture and the support from the government define marriage as "the state of being united to a person of the same sex in a relationship like that of a traditional marriage, same-sex marriage" (Merriam-Webster).  For few years now, media, the influential people in Hollywood and in businesses, and few people in government were pressuring the biblical definition of marriage to redefine so homosexual can be accepted in the community. The debate arose when the law, "Don't ask, don't tell," that "was the official United States policy on homosexuals serving in the military from December 21, 19...

One of the verses that keeps me back to the scripture would be First Peter 3:7: "Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered." It puts me from being religious since service to God flows out from how me and my wife live.  I think that the popularity or pressure from others pushes man to compromise on their relationship while continuing praying and serving God.  By taking this verse literally, I understand that my prayers are empty if my relationship with my wife is broken.  The whole act of serving God becomes religious and vein if I depart from understanding my wife and honor her as a weak vessel.  

For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures ,  that he was buried , that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures,   and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.  Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep.   Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.   Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.   For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.   But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.   Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.  (1 Corinthians 15:3)