Good Morning, Dear Father. Thanks for waking me this day, and Lord, I love You. I really do love You and appreciate all You do for all of us. Thanks for watching over family and friends, and thanks for just being You. Lord, each day I want to get nearer and nearer to You. Today I pray for all those on this line who are really dear to me, Dear Father. So many friends, such dear friends and so many that I have never had the privilege of meeting them all. I am so thankful that years ago I came to You. Oh, how I love you, Lord. Thanks for the great day yesterday, from sunup until sundown, just perfect as You planned it all out. Please keep Your healing hand on those on our prayer list, and again, please bring peace in this country and around the world. I pray today for our veterans, for our military, and I pray You will keep them safe and those on the front lines, please bring them home safe and soon. Be with those who lay their lives on the line for us each day, including those in the military, the police officers in all branches, the firefighters, most of whom take no pay. Lord, be with all those who work to keep us safe and healthy including our doctors. Work through the doctors' hands. Now, Lord, please send me words for my message and then dispatch it for me, please. And please help me with spelling and grammar as I want to get it right for you. In Jesus' Name, I pray. Amen.
Dear brothers and sisters, this is indeed the day that the Lord has made. So was yesterday, and unless He returns, He will make another one for us tomorrow. I don't know about you folks, but as I age, each day is better than the day before, each breath of air is more special than the one before that. Today please pray for our military, past and present, pray for police and firefighters. And while praying for firefighters, please pray for Robert "Lee" Coburn as he will be having surgery for cancer next week. Also pray for this line and the devil keeps his hands off of it. God is so good, folks. Now let me see if I can wrap up this series. So how many thorns do you have stuck in you?
Friday July 26, 2013, The Thorn, Day Five.
2 Corinthians 12:7 - To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me.
2 Corinthians 12:9 - But He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boat all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. 10 That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Job 2:1 - On another day the angels came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came with them to present himself before Him. 2 And the Lord said to Satan, "Where have you come from?" Satan answered the Lord, "From roaming through the earth and going back and forth in it." 3 Then the Lord said to Satan, "Have you considered my servant Job? There is no one on earth like him; he is blameless and upright, a man who fears God and shuns evil. And he still maintains his integrity, though you incited Me against him to ruin him without any reason.
Job 2:4 - "Skin for skin!" Satan replied. "A man will give all he has for his own life. 5 But stretch out your hand and strike his flesh and bones, and he will surely curse You to Your face." 6 The Lord said to Satan, "Very well then, he is in your hands; but you must spare his life." 7 So Satan went out from the presence of the Lord and afflicted Job with painful sores from the soles of his feet to the top of his head. 8 Then Job took a piece of broken pottery and scraped himself with it as he sat among the ashes. (NIV)
Job 2:9 - His wife said to him, "Are you still holding onto your integrity? Curse God and die!" 10 He replied, you are talking like a foolish woman. Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?" (NIV)
Brothers and sisters, according to my Bible footnotes to "Curse God" traced back to Hebrew is an expression and means "Bless God." I wanted to trace that back for indeed some of the sayings back then were very different than now. Things have changed in words. When I came out of high school and a person would sign your yearbook saying "thanks for being gay" that would mean thanks for being a happy person. That is just one example of differences, and there are many. Things, people, and most everything has changed, except for, EXCEPT FOR JESUS, OF COURSE. You can find that of course in the Bible, and again I will point that out to all of you.
Hebrews 13: 8 - Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. (NIV)
Yesterday I left you with a few questions. Here they are. What happens next? Does Job turn from the Lord because of this sickness? What does Job's wife have to say? Just how will Job handle this?
Will Job turn from God? No, not at all, and we see his statement to his wife, "Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?" Brothers and sisters, trouble does come our way, and while God is very good to us, we do have some trouble that comes from God. Maybe my best example is the weather. God is still in control of it, good or bad, sunshine and storms. And folks, Job is right, we must take the bad with the good, and indeed as we look back at some of the scriptures of this week, we find that Paul stated "That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong." Trust me when I say that I have come closer to God after my motorcycle accident than before. I want to get nearer each day and as my body gets weaker, my love and strength coming from God gets stronger. How about you? How do people who do not know Jesus get through the passing of a loved one? It seems Job's wife thought he was "nuts" (my wording, not hers). But I have had people ask me point blank, where was your Jesus when you were run over? My answer was, and still is, I am alive and working for Him, and if it were not for the accident, where would I be? The pain inflicted on us, and we for sure want to get rid of it for it is indeed a thorn in our flesh, but so often it brings us nearer to our Creator and His love for us will carry us on.
God is so good, and some sweet day when we get the call to come home, home to our mansion, then the thorns will all be removed, the pain will be over,and we can be with Jesus. Until that time, I want you to again think of the pain Jesus endured for us just to take away our sins. Think of it, and think of Job and his statement "Shall we accept good from God, and not trouble?" Brothers and sisters, let's just get out and work for Him in all we do.
Now go forth, sharing your blessings, loving Jesus more each day, digging into The Word and sharing it with others. Jesus loves us all so much, so many people love each of us, and we need to love Jesus above all others and then we need to love family and friends and enemies just as the Bible tells us. So today and this weekend and all the days we have left, let's step out for Jesus, let's step out in faith and in love. And speaking of Love, I love ya. Pass it on.
Pastor Dan
Pastor Dan's Safety Tip: If you are driving and you are tired, pull off the road and rest a bit. Don't take a snooze when you drive, for if you snooze you lose!
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