July 23, 2010 Four Letter Words

Love the Lord your God and keep His requirements, His decrees, His laws and His commands always.

Good Morning, my dear brothers and sisters. It is Friday and the day we pray for all our brothers and sisters who go into the Fields of Harvest for Our Lord Jesus to tell the Good News.

Mark 16:15 - He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the Good News to all creation." (NIV)

All of us are on orders from God to follow this Scripture as all of us need to follow all of His, well, just look at my lead Scripture for a start. So we pray for those working the Fields for Jesus and we pray for those who are not to get cracking! Also please keep praying for Tom Border and please today pray for Oliver Ogden that God will give him an open airway so he does not need to carry that bottle over his back.

Four Letter Words 5: Deuteronomy 11:1 - Love the Lord your God and keep His requirements, His decrees, His laws and His commands always. (NIV)

Psalm 23:6 - Surely goodness and Love will follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. (NIV)

This has been a great week looking at those good four letter words. At a sing-along yesterday at the Bridges I told them I was preaching on four letter words this coming Sunday. You could hear the big gasps of air. Of course like most people when you hear someone say something about four letter words, they are talking about the curse words. So again I say this has been another fun week with our Lord working on what He directs me to do. God is so good (good is a four letter word).

By now most of you have figured out that I have indeed saved what in my opinion and also in the scripture that I used yesterday, that Love is the best of the best four letter words. Right now I want you to do something for me, please do this, please... Take you hands up from the computer and sit back in your chair or even stand up. Stretch out your arms, straight from your shoulders to the side, stretch them out far. Now picture Jesus with His arms stretched out on the cross while He was nailed there for you and for me to take away our sins and to carry our burdens. Now folks, that is true LOVE. No greater Love... now we are going to look at a few more scriptures about love...

John 16:13 - Greater LOVE has no one than to this, that he lay down his life for his friends. (NIV)

As we see, our Lord Jesus was our friend, and He indeed showed that love when He laid down His life for us. Also, folks, we live in a free country (not talking taxes here); we live in a free country and that is because we had many, many, many men and women in our military lay down their lives for this nation and the friends of America. And I feel that that Scripture also holds for those who were willing to lay down their love, and went and did the same things in the military as those who died in battle, but came home either wounded or safe. NO GREATER LOVE!!!

Now I must go to the great commandments, for they talk about love and this is one we must do, yes, this is a must do to get into heaven...

Mark 12:29/31 29 - "The most important one", answered Jesus, "is this 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one." 30 "LOVE the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength." 31 "The second is this: 'LOVE your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these." (NIV)

Now while it is easy to Love God, it gets harder for some to love their neighbor when their neighbor might be a different color, or race or religion. We must Love everyone for our neighborhood is the WHOLE WORLD. Now this one makes it hard... listen up...

Matthew 5:43/45 43 - "You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'" 44 "But I tell you: LOVE your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous." (NIV)

Are you seeing that it is hard some days as to be a Christian, to be born again we do have some rules we must follow to get into heaven. It is not just saying save me Jesus, we must then work for Him to show our faith. I know people who hate others, and in some cases that hate will block them from Heaven. Some when I write this will know I am talking about them, while others might feel this tugging at them and I don't even know them. Sometimes it is a past spouse, and folks, you've got to get rid of the hate, you've got to get over it. You must LOVE them, you really must. Sometimes it is ones you must work with. And you know, there are people who hate others, who, I truly believe they don't know why they hate the other person. This is so important, brothers and sisters, we must LOVE, it is a commandment from God and Jesus tells us we must love even our enemies. And we need to pray for our enemies. I think we need to take this word of advice, and I do mean you and me, and am I writing advice for myself? Yes. We must love all people as God Loved His Son... Listen to this...

Mark 1:11 - And a voice came from Heaven: "You are My Son, whom I LOVE; with You I am well pleased." (NIV)

This was God The Father of Jesus, and our Father also, talking to Jesus after He was baptized by John. Now I ask this, do you live daily to please Jesus? Will Jesus look at you and say I am well pleased? I know He LOVES all of us, even those who hate Him, but is He pleased with You today? Now you see I say God loves all of us even those who hate Him, but even with that Love for all, we still must love Him and our neighbors and our enemies to get into heaven. Now to back this up even more...

Mark 9:7 - Then a cloud appeared and enveloped them, and a voice came from the cloud: This is my Son whom I Love. Listen to Him." (NIV)

Folks, I need to stop someplace, as I could write about four letter words and talk about those from the Bible for many a day. If we would talk just the Scriptures about Love, we would be going on for days.

Dear Father in Heaven. I Love You, and I pray right now that all who are reading today can tell You that also... I Love You, Jesus. Please help us all to Love you deeper and deeper each day and live to please You and to keep all commands from You, not just those that we think of as commandments, I pray that You will give us a push so that we do Your work. Thanks for loving us, for loving me enough to die for all of us. Please take care of all Your workers and also please take care of my dear friend Oliver. And please take the infection from Tom. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.

Now go forth in love and share your blessings, and let me put this Scripture with you right now...

1 Corinthians 13:13 - And now these three remain; faith, HOPE and LOVE. But the greatest of these is LOVE. (NIV)

And as I sign out each day, Love Ya, Pastor Dan, I want you to know that I really do Love you all. I am answering a call from God to write each day and it is my love for Him and also for all of you that I do this... So, Love ya, Pastor Dan.

Carry The Light Ministries
16 Dewalt Drive.
Mechanicsburg, Pa. 17050
Phones Home 717 691 8200 Pastor's cell 717 991 0754