Friday 11/15/13 A Time 3

Dear Father in Heaven:  Thank You for another day, and thanks for watching over us during the night.  Lord,  I pray today for healing for Ruby, Patsy, Burt, Eleanor, Dolores, Dan, Dan Stoner, and also Vicki.  I pray that a door is opened for Craig to get a job and that he will go and look for it.  Lord, we all from time to time need to remember that when we pray, we need to listen for answers and then act on Your answers.  Help us remember it, dear Lord, please help us.  Now, dear Father, please help me with the message, and may the words be Yours and not my thinking.  Then, Dear Father, please dispatch it for me.  In Jesus' Name, I pray.  Amen.

Dear brothers and sisters, please keep praying for this line and praying for God's healing hand on me.  I think what I have is turning around and I should be fine to preach on Sunday.  God is good.  I have never missed a call since we went to The Bridges.  All honor for that to God.  Okay, now to the message, "A Time."

Friday, November 15, 2013, "A Time," Day Three.

Ecclesiastes 3:4 - A time to weep and a time to laugh, a time to mourn and a time to dance.  (NIV)

Brothers and sisters, there is in life a time to weep and a time to laugh and I hope to show you some of them today that God has pointed out to me.  Look at these scriptures.

Luke 6:20 - Looking at His disciples, He said:  "Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the Kingdom of God.  21 Blessed are you who hunger now, for you will be satisfied.  Blessed are you who WEEP now for you will LAUGH.  (NIV)

Our Lord Jesus tells us in Luke that we will be  blessed if we weep now for we will laugh.  As I look around us here on earth today it would be very easy to weep or cry and some days you just want to do that.  I talked yesterday about Harrisburg, PA, the city I grew up in, and today when I do drive there, I want to cry.  Yesterday I went to the doctor's office, and right outside the door, two big fresh hunks of chewing gum spit out for people to walk on.  You just want to cry.  (No, I did not pick it up and chew it.)  I am so glad that God gave me a "funny bone" and gave us the ability to laugh, and even the ability to laugh things off sometimes that we would like to cry about.  Do you remember the commercial a few years or so back when the "American Indian" was shown on his horse crying over the way people were trashing up our country?  Think about this one a tad.  You an weep when you see that trash lying along the road, it is so sad, but when you see the work gang from the prisons picking up the trash, it does put a smile on your face, right?  Putting this back to where it is intended is that here on earth we will weep, but there will be none of that in Heaven, only joy.

Now some say that men don't cry and there is no crying in baseball.  I want to tell you that God gave me tears that come easy.  But it is okay, for I know my Lord set an example of just that so men, it is okay to let the tears flow.

John 11:35 - Jesus wept.  (NIV)

Now let's look at a time to mourn and a time to dance.  You know when we have a loved one or dear friend pass away we go through a time of mourning, and while that mourning time might be longer for some than others, and while people say that time heals all sounds, the memories of those we mourn don't leave us.  You never want to give up the good memories of those in your past that have gone, we pray,  home to the Lord, but we should put away the things you might remember that were bad.  One of the things that is neat to know about our Lord is that we can go to a funeral service in a church and we can mourn for the deceased and then go back to that same church and see people dance for the Lord.  Oh, yes, people dance out for the Lord and you can do it anyplace, even in church.

2 Samuel 6:14 - David, wearing a linen ephod, danced before the Lord with all his might.  (NIV)

I want you to notice that David did not just dance before the Lord, HE DANCED WITH ALL HIS MIGHT.

Psalm 149:3 - Let them praise His name with dancing and make music to Him with tambourine and harp.  (NIV)

Brothers and sisters, let's praise the Lord in all we do, and when we can dance, let's dance.  It happened years ago, our now 30-year old grandson Keith Lehman, Jr., was along with us on a concert.  If I remember, he was 14 at the time.  We were singing at Manor Care in Camp Hill, PA, and we were singing "When the Roll is Called Up Yonder," when a senior lady who was in a wheelchair got up and danced and danced.  Keith Jr. asked about it, as the staff at Manor Care was amazed, for the lady was truly wheelchair bound.  This lady danced in the spirit of the Lord.  It was a beautiful thing to see.  After the song she went back to the wheelchair and when our concert was over, she was pushed from the room.  Dance, brothers and sisters, dance, and do it with all your might for the Lord.

Dear Father in Heaven, help us as we mourn and then help us to dance and help us always to come nearer and nearer to You.  In the name of Jesus, I pray.  Amen.

Now go forth and share your blessings.  Love Ya.  Please pass that love on.  Pastor Dan