Thursday 7/3/14 Blessed 3

Dear Father in Heaven:  Thanks for another day here on earth.  I love You and I give thanks to You for forgiving my sins and the sins of those who ask You.  Lord, please be with the mission team from Lighthouse Baptist Church as they outreach in Your name in Haiti.  Protect them, Lord, and help them lead many to the feet of Jesus to be saved.  Lord, be with Leann and Tiffany as they travel home.  Lord, be with Tara as she flies back from Spain.  Lord, be with our dear neighbors and protect their family in travel.  Be with the Crocketts as they travel.  Lord, it is a busy time here in America.  Please, please, bless this very unworthy country of the blessings.  And yes, none of us is worthy of Your blessings, so Lord, I really appreciate what You do.  Lord, there are others on our prayer list, and I ask You to take care of them according to Your will.  Please bless me now with another message, and then help me please to dispatch it.  In Jesus' Name, I pray.  Amen.

Dear brothers and sisters, we are getting a nice rain as I am typing this message.  Please keep covering in prayer all people who are traveling.  And pray for those mission teams and all those Vacation Bible Schools going on.  Thanks for your support of this line.  I will be posting a writing for Independence Day right after I send out this message.  I want all of you to know that you may use anything I write if it will  help others come to Christ.  The same is for my writing for Independence Day.  On Sunday in church Dolores will be back-grounding me with America, The Beautiful, as I read the writing.  Let me get to the message.

Thursday, July 3, 2014, Blessed (Day Three)

Proverbs 10:22 - The blessing of the Lord brings wealth, and He adds no trouble to it. (NIV)

I just love this series, for we are just so blessed and it is throughout the Bible.  In this scripture we see that the "Blessing of the Lord brings Wealth."  However, please do not think of wealth coming in just money or things.  First we must know and understand that our best blessing of the Lord is our Salvation through Jesus.  We also  have wealth here on earth.  One thing I count as wealth is family, and another is friends.  You are also wealthy if you have good health.  Now if you want to see some wealth right now, go to the cupboard and open it.  I just know you will find food in it.  Also, please think of the Mansion that we will have someday.

Malachi 3:12 - Then all the nations will call you blessed for yours will be a delightful land, says the Lord Almighty.  (NIV)

Now to get the full effect of this scripture, please open your Bible and read Malachi 3:6 through 3:12.  This scripture tells you that you just cannot out-give our Lord and it is the only place I have found in the Bible where we are told we can "test God on this."  This is a great scripture and those who have learned over the years to give to God off the top of their pay will find how great God's math really is.  One of the reasons I feel that God does Bless America, and again I pray those blessings continue, is because we are a giving nation.  We help other countries, and we help lots and lots of needy people right here in our good old USA.

Acts 10:35 - In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus Himself said:  "It is more blessed to give than to receive."  (NIV)

Back when I was just a child, back when the streets were still dirt and the Dead Sea, still sick, my dear late Mamma taught me a lot of great things.  "Share your toys," "Put the lid down after you use the potty."  "Don't pick your nose."  "Eat everything you put on your plate or someone in China will starve."  (I saved a lot of lives in China.)  And she taught me this one also, and here we find it did not just come from our Mammas, it came right from Jesus.  "It is more blessed to give than to receive."  Most of us who grew up in Christian homes heard all of these neat rules.  I must tell you of this one time how this really worked for me.  I am going way back, and my mamma told me not to leave the house or yard.  She was in the basement doing washing and working so hard, so I robbed my little bank and went to the corner store and purchased two ice cream cones.  I came home and went to the basement eating one of the cones, the other I had behind my back.  My mamma told me, "I told you not to leave the house or yard and you did not listen, so I must punish you."  I knew, just knew I was going to get a spanking, then I pulled out the cone for her and she started to cry.  I got a hug, not a spanking and found out it was better to give the cone than receive the spanking.  Once again I must tell you that this relates also to those verses in Malachi, and you just cannot out-give the Lord.  His blessings will always be better than what we do.

I want to quote Pastor Dr. Richard Denison, who said:  "We are blessed to be a blessing."  By the way, please pray for Pastor Rick, as he is one who told me that he would perform gay weddings.  Pray, warriors, pray.

Revelation 22:14- "Blessed are those who wash their robes, that they may have the right to the tree of life and may go through the gates into the city."  (NIV)

I find no better way to wrap up this series about being Blessed than to quote Jesus, and you can read it right here and now.  So let's close by praying for our robes to be washed.  I know we have done it before, but brothers and sisters, I really have a passion to lead people to Christ, and I just don't know when all on the line have been saved, or if they are.  I am sure you who are saved understand this.

Dear Father in Heaven:  Please wash me free of sins this day, Lord, and get me ready to go into the City.  In Jesus' Name, I say, please do this for us, and thank You for doing it.  Amen.

Now go forth and share your blessings.  Love ya, and please pass on my love to others.

Pastor Dan