Saturday 10/31/15 Assignments (9)

Dear Father in Heaven: I love You, and I want to thank You for being with me today and also with members of my late brother's family as they gathered together for the funeral service of Stephen Lehman. Thanks for the safe out and safe back. Father, please be with those who we have been praying for this past week. Please, Lord, be with the families of those lost in the airplane crash. Lord,please help us to reach others before it is too late. Please, Lord, I want to be part of that through this line. Lord, so many think heaven is automatic. Thanks for dying for all of us, Lord, and forgiving all who ask. Lord, please help me now with another message and then please help me to get it dispatched. In the Name of Jesus, I give thanks and praise. Amen.

Dear brothers and sisters, today we all have one assignment that is the same. Okay, more than one, but one here on earth. Tomorrow morning at 2:00 AM, we turn the clocks back one hour. I was told that you gain back the hour that we lost in the spring. That is just not true. Wanting to do things right, I set my alarm for 2:00 AM and in the spring I wake up and set it to 3:00 AM and lose 1 hour sleep, right? Right! In the all I did the same thing, I set my alarm at 2:00 AM and when it went off, I got up and turned the clock back an hour. Then at 2:00 that clock went off again, so I got up and turned the clock back an hour. Then at 2:00 AM that darn old clock went off again, so I got up and turned it back an hour. And so it went, until I noticed it was daylight and I must have been doing something wrong. Worst night's sleep I ever had. Okay, so I made the story up, and yes, I have been telling it for years, and you are indeed welcome to use it. I have learned since then to just turn it back before going to bed. But wait, be careful, sometimes if you turn it back, it just might be turned back again since a lot of things are automatic. Well, getting into heaven is not automatic, so let me get to another assignment from God.

Saturday: October 31, 2015: Assignments (Day Nine)

Mark 12:28 - One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating. Noticing that Jesus had given them a good answer, he asked Him, "Of all the commandments, which is the most important?" 29 "The most important one," answered Jesus, "is this: 'Hear, O Israel, the Lord your 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)

Two more great assignments from our Lord Jesus Christ. Which one might be the harder to do? If we would learn to follow these two assignments they would indeed cover all ten of the ones we talked about yesterday. Think about this real hard. Which of these two must we really follow if we are going to go to heaven? Both of them, of course. There are a few things I want to point out about both of them.

In verse 30 it tells us we have to Love the Lord that would be Jesus Christ, and we must do it with ALL of our heart, soul, mind and strength. It does not say some of it or part of it, or every now and then, this means all the time, ALL THE TIME. Once we really fall in love with Jesus that gets a lot easier to do, but sometimes we slip on it. Oh, the love goes on, but some days maybe our heart is not in it like it should be. Maybe we are having a bad day. But that is when we should come nearer to Him. Some days our minds might wander or take a walk so to speak, and don't tell me it never happened to you. And as for our strength, and this is now how strong your muscles are, this is tied in with your mind. This is why we must use them all together, our heart, soul, mind and strength, to love our Lord Jesus and it needs to be done 24/7.

In verse 31 it talks about Loving your neighbor as yourself. Now I talked about this one some time back. First things first, we need to love ourselves. Yes, that does not mean we put ourselves ahead of others, but we do need to love ourselves. So go take a look in the mirror and tell yourself, I love you! I mean if you hate yourself, how could you love someone else? Now let us look at who our neighbors are. They are not just the person next door or across the street. They are not just the ones living behind you, they are worldwide. This morning an airliner went down. Everyone on-board was killed. I do pray they knew Jesus. All of those on-board were our neighbors, and I understand all were from Russia. Your next door neighbors are those of different colors. Remember the song from Vacation Bible School. Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world. RED AND YELLOW, BLACK AND WHITE, they are precious in His sight? Now there are blended families, and we need to love them all.

So our assignments from God today, Love God and ALL others, including our very own selves. Amen.

Dear Father in Heaven, please help me to love, and t love more and more each day. Help me learn that the greatest gift that You gave to all of us was/is love, for You sent Jesus to die for us, and Father that is great love. Thanks for doing that for us. In Jesus' Name, I pray. Amen.

Brothers and sisters, let us go out singing that Vacation Bible School song. I am going to do the words by heart, and it has been a long time since I went to Bible School.

Jesus love the little children, all the children of the world.
Red and yellow, black or white,
they are precious in His sight.
Jesus loves the little children of the world.

Jesus love the little children, all the children of the world.
Red and yellow, black or white,
they are precious in His sight.
Jesus loves the little children of the world.

How did I do? Can you believe today is the last day of October? Fifty-five days until Christmas. I wonder, can I be a bear and sleep from Christmas to Easter?