Monday 1/19/15 Temptation

Dear Father in Heaven:  I love You very much.  Please forgive me of my sins, and thanks for dying to clear me of my sins.  Thanks for hearing our prayers and acting on them according to Your will for us.  Please, Lord, help me with the daily messages.  I  have been struggling to receive messages from You.  Please help me with them and help me with my concentration.  I would really appreciate it as I want to get back to writing a daily message for You and what You want me to write.  Please, Lord, lower my pain level as this might help.  So please now help me with the message and to get it dispatched.  In the Name of Jesus, I pray.  Amen.

Dear brothers and sisters, I want you to know that I love all of you.  Please keep praying that some pain would let up.  It seems to be working on my mind somewhat.  I want to get back to writing daily and being more regular than I have been doing.  I want to get started with the message right now.  A new series:  TEMPTATION.

Matthew 4:1 - Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil.  2 After fasting forty days and forty nights, He was hungry.  3 The tempter came to Him and said, "If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread."  4 Jesus answered, "It is written:  'Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"  (NIV)

I want to ask all of you this.  Have you ever been tempted?  In the scripture above we see that even Jesus was tempted and He was tempted by Satan, by the leader of evil, the old devil himself.  And I know I have been tempted over the years, and while I would love to blame the temptations on the devil, I just can't do all that.

In the scripture above, we see that Jesus had fasted for forty days and night, He was hungry and Satan was tempting Him with food.  I know that over the years I have been tempted by food.  I love to eat and there was a time I really needed to lose weight.  Well, it was not the devil that would tempt me, it was that one king, you know the one, The Burger King.  Most of us handle temptation well, for if we really look at things, we can get tempted often in the course of a day.  Those wanting to lose weight get tempted by all the commercials that are on television each day.  Some of us have other habits and that temptation gets great also and it is not Satan, unless you spell Satan "Caddy."  And then there are those other temptations, like low cut tops on ladies, and short skirts on ladies, and yes, ladies, those muscle shirts that some men wear.

We can read about Jesus being tempted and how He handled that temptation, and we need to call on Jesus to help us when we are being tempted.  One thing you will find out is that Jesus will not tempt you, and He will help you if you just go to Him in prayer and ask Him to help you.  Over the next couple of days we are going to take a look at some things that tempt us and how we can get Jesus to help us handle those temptations.  For now, let's talk a tad about Salvation.  Today, this Monday is Martin Luther King, Jr., day.  I want to thank him for all that he did working for our Lord Jesus.  I am sure that if he was walking this earth today he would tell all of us that we need to all get along and also that there would be no one in Heaven that did not love our Lord Jesus.  I think if all of us, if all people really loved Jesus, not just said they did, if everyone loved Jesus, there would not be race issues.  I have mentioned this before, there really is only one race, the human race.  Let us take a look at Salvation this day.

John 14:6 - Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me."  (NIV)

Please, dear Father in Heaven:  Please forgive me of my sins, and please save me this day, for when You call me, I want to come to Heaven.  I believe You died for me and were risen from the dead.  In Jesus' Name, I pray.  Amen.

Now go forth and share your blessings.  Love ya.  Please share my love with others.

Pastor Dan